Memorial Day is considered the unofficial start of summer as school kids are on break and family’s plan the annual vacation and other summertime activities.
Officially, Memorial Day honors Americans who have died in armed conflicts over the last 248 years.
The history of Memorial Day
“Three years after the Civil War ended, on May 5, 1868, the head of an organization of Union veterans — the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) — established Decoration Day as a time for the nation to decorate the graves of the war dead with flowers,” read a website from the U.S. Department of Veteran’s Affairs (VA).
Since the Revolutionary War ended, more than 600,000 American troops have died in battle and more than 539,000 died from non-combated related causes, according to Military.com.
Decoration Day ceremonies evolved for the remainder of the 1800s and well into the 1900s. In 1971 Decoration Day was changed to Memorial Day as Congress declared the last Monday in May as the national holiday, according to the U.S. Veterans Administration.