Like most American holidays, Memorial Day has evolved into Memorial Day Weekend, a grand holiday weekend full of parades, picnics and pool openings. Memorial Day also marks the unofficial start of summer. Many of us will be taking our first trip of the summer season to the beach or to the woods.
When I was a kid, we always visited the cemetary over Memorial Day weekend. For the Memorial Day parade, we would decorate our bikes with red, white and blue crepe paper. All the kids would ride their bikes at the end of the parade behind the fire trucks.
According to The World Book Encyclopedia, The first Memorial Day or Decoration Day as it was known, was held in 1866 to honor soldiers killed in the American Civil War. Memorial Day is now celebrated on the last Monday of May. It became a federal holiday in 1971.
For more information about Memorial Day, visit the Department of Veterans Affairs website. For free Memorial Day images and clip art like the photo below, try the Public Domain Clip Art Blog.
Photo by Kathleen T. Rhem
~Marian
Filed under: Teen Interest | Tagged: Memorial Day | 1 Comment »
