Honoring & Remembering those Who Have Served

Memorial Day was celebrated on Monday with gatherings happening across Blaine County in private memorials or at larger social gatherings. The Chinook Veterans of Foreign Wars held their Annual Celebration at the Chinook Cemetery, recognizing all those service members that have left us. In Harlem, the Annual Memorial Day Remembrance was held at the Harlem Cemetery and services were also held at the Wing, Silver Bow and Turner Cemeteries.

The first Memorial Day was held on May 30, 1868. Originally referred to as 'Decoration Day' and meant to honor the more than 620,000 Americans that lost their lives during the Civil War. Later it came to be known as Memorial Day. The idea of recognizing the services of and honoring those who died in war can be traced back more than 24 centuries to Pericles who ordered a tribute be held for those killed in the Peloponnesian War. The same concept is applied today with the creation of Memorial Day. More than 1.1 million Americans have died in our nation's wars, "Not only are they commemorated by columns and inscriptions, but there dwells also an unwritten memorial of them, graven not on stone but in the hearts of men."

Now celebrated nationwide in almost every state on the final Monday of May when Congress passed the National Holiday Act of 1971, ensuring a three-day weekend for Federal Holidays. In December of 2000, Congress passed the "The National Moment of Remembrance Act," making sure that all the memories and sacrifices of America's service hero's is never forgotten. The Act created a White House Commission on the National Moment of Remembrance. The Commission Mission Statement, "encourage the people of the United States to give something back to their country, which provides them so much freedom and opportunity" by encouraging and coordinating commemorations in the United States of Memorial Day and the National Moment of Remembrance.