Across America on Monday, people will have the day off, and will spend their time with family, both to enjoy fellowship and recreation, and to commemorate the men and women who have died fighting for the country that has afforded us so many blessings.
Here at Liberty Unyielding, we figure it’s all about the memory of our fallen heroes. It’s about those whom they carried in their hearts, who will never forget them. It’s about the America we love.
So there may be unseemly battles for narrative and rhetoric going on out there. But among the treasured citizens of LU Nation, Memorial Day is about remembering, with gratitude and the highest respect – and recognizing how that endows us with hope and a future.
Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
Stick with me here, as you won’t want to miss the grand finale of this one.
We begin with a combined children’s choir in San Diego performing “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee” on 31 May, 2015.
One of the loveliest Memorial Day tributes is made in Boston, where a “garden” of more than 33,000 flags is now planted each year on Boston Common to commemorate all the Massachusetts fallen from America’s wars.
We continue with our gaze on the American Revolutionary War. We note a most compelling piece in the Philadelphia Inquirer about a local couple, members of the Old Pine Street Presbyterian Church, who have made a vocation of identifying the Revolutionary War soldiers who are buried in the church’s cemetery, which dates to about 1764.
Reportedly, when Ronn and Ellen Shaffer moved to Spruce Street in 2000, only nine of the Revolutionary War soldiers in the church cemetery were known. In the years since, Ronn Shaffer has identified more than 270 additional veterans of the Revolution, using church and local records.
Needless to say, the Revolutionary War veterans are honored with flags every year.
We move on to a few images that convey the vastness and diversity of the service members who have died fighting for America.
An LU salute wouldn’t be complete without an address from Ronald Reagan. Here, he speaks at Arlington National Cemetery 30 years ago, on Memorial Day, 1986. His words are worth listening to both for the sense of a disappearing past, and the sense that what he says still applies to our present and future, and the courage we need for both.
Our military conflicts continue today, and soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines continue to be brought home from the battlefield to their final resting place. Here are just a few we know are remembered well on this Memorial Day.
Staff Sergeant Jason Rogers, USMC, of Brandon, MS (killed in Afghanistan, 2011)
First Sergeant John Locicero of Buffalo, NY (died in South Korea, 2015)
Navy SEAL Chief Petty Officer Collin T. Thomas of Morehead, KY (killed in Afghanistan, 2010)
I doubt LU readers need this next reminder. But the image conveys everything that matters about the gravity and heroism of giving all for your country – that she and her people may be free.
There are plenty of more polished and elaborate videos out there of the 21-gun salute and Taps on Memorial Day, and at military funerals. But, for our grand finale, I think you’ll see why I had to choose this one, from an unnamed commemoration in Texas.
We will never forget.
