Have a great Holiday weekend you guys

[grandsport]

I'm looking foward to it and the weather is going to be great. Be safe and enjoy!!!!

[rak1]

Thanks Gary and you too have a great weekend.

[Ms Grumpy]

I hope everyone has a safe, fun holiday weekend. Remember to take a minute to give thanks for all the Service Men and Women. Here is a little history on Memorial Day.


At the end of the Civil War, communities set aside a day to mark the end of the war or as a memorial to those who had died. Some of the places creating an early memorial day include Sharpsburg, Maryland, located near Antietam Battlefield; Charleston, South Carolina; Boalsburg, Pennsylvania;; Carbondale, Illinois; Columbus, Mississippi; many communities in Vermont; and some two dozen other cities and towns. These observances coalesced around Decoration Day, honoring the Confederate dead, and the several Confederate Memorial Days.

According to Professor David Blight of the Yale University History Department, the first memorial day was observed by formerly enslaved black people at the Washington Race Course (today the location of Hampton Park) in Charleston, South Carolina. The race course had been used as a temporary Confederate prison camp for captured Union soldiers in 1865, as well as a mass grave for Union soldiers who died there. Immediately after the cessation of hostilities, formerly enslaved people exhumed the bodies from the mass grave and reinterred them properly with individual graves. They built a fence around the graveyard with an entry arch and declared it a Union graveyard. The work was completed in only ten days. On May 1, 1865, the Charleston newspaper reported that a crowd of up to ten thousand, mainly black residents, including 2800 children, proceeded to the location for included sermons, singing, and a picnic on the grounds, thereby creating the first Decoration Day.

The first observance was in Waterloo, New York on May 5, 1866, and each year thereafter. The friendship between General John Murray, a distinguished citizen of Waterloo, and General John A. Logan, who helped bring attention to the event nationwide, was likely a factor in the holiday's growth. On May 5, 1868, in his capacity as commander-in-chief of the Grand Army of the Republic, a veterans' organization, Logan issued a proclamation that "Decoration Day" be observed nationwide. It was observed for the first time on May 30 of the same year; the date was chosen because it was not the anniversary of a battle. The tombs of fallen Union soldiers were decorated in remembrance.

Many of the states of the U.S. South refused to celebrate Decoration Day, due to lingering hostility towards the Union Army and also because there were relatively few veterans of the Union Army who were buried in the South. A notable exception was Columbus, Mississippi, which on April 25, 1866, at its Decoration Day commemorated both the Union and Confederate casualties buried in its cemetery.

The alternative name of "Memorial Day" was first used in 1882. It did not become more common until after World War II, and was not declared the official name by Federal law until 1967. On June 28, 1968, the United States Congress passed the Uniform Holidays Bill, which moved three holidays from their traditional dates to a specified Monday in order to create a convenient three-day weekend. The holidays included Washington's Birthday, now celebrated as Presidents' Day; Veterans Day and Memorial Day. The change moved Memorial Day from its traditional May 30 date to the last Monday in May. The law took effect at the federal level in 1971.

After some initial confusion and unwillingness to comply, all 50 states adopted the measure within a few years. In 1978, Veterans Day was changed back to its traditional date on November 11. Most corporate businesses no longer close on Veterans Day, Columbus Day or President's Day, with the day after Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, and/or New Year's Eve often substituted as more convenient "holidays" for their employees. Memorial Day endures as a holiday which most businesses observe because it marks the beginning of the "summer vacation season." This role is filled in neighboring Canada by Victoria Day, which occurs either on May 24 or the last Monday before that date, placing it exactly one week before Memorial Day.

[piette]

Enjoy your weekends. I have a list longer than both my arms of things to get done around here, if half of it gets done I will be really happy for sure. Just tonight we took the chevelle and went to a nursery and greenhouse and filled the trucnk with new plantings that I get to do tomorrow. Plus now that I have my truck running good again, I have to make a run to the dump, and finish building fence gates, mow the lawn, set up the patio furniture.............

Jeff

[Highway Star]

I've been to the "Birthplace of Memorial Day", Waterloo, NY. I actually lived in the next town over, Seneca Falls, NY. It happens to be the "Birthplace of Women's Rights".

I'm just hangin' around the house this weekend. My favorite thing to do.

[shadowgray396]

Originally Posted by stalkingbear

Yea! We will be in the mid 70's finally!

Maybe our cold wet spring will go away!

Ya'll have a great one, remember our warriors, fly your flags!

Maybe 70, another 55 degrees today and rain. They keep saying another 24 hours and it will be warming up everyday. Will be down at the beach house this weekend. Everyone have a great weekend and I agree remember our service people who are serving us and our vets. My youngest daughter enters the service June 15, right out of High School.
Ray

[grandsport]

Originally Posted by Highway Star

I've been to the "Birthplace of Memorial Day", Waterloo, NY. I actually lived in the next town over, Seneca Falls, NY. It happens to be the "Birthplace of Women's Rights".

I'm just hangin' around the house this weekend. My favorite thing to do.

My favorite too.

[shadowgray396]

Her name is Carol and will be joining the Army. She has passed her entrance exams and will be a mechanic. She love helping work on my Chevelle. I though she might be joining the Coast Guard since she has been in Bend going to their school there to finish High School. I proud of her for working so hard to finish school. I didn't think we would get her through it.
Ray

[Hank70SS]

Well Lynda is working every day at HD, she works for the company that supplies the flowers. Got the back grass cut Thursday, the front yesterday, an hour of pushing the hand mower today and I'll be done.

A few other little things to do but mostly just hanging around. Be safe and enjoy your weekend.