Veterans Day

Today we in the U.S. celebrate Veterans Day. It is a day of remembrance which officially ended WW I ("the war to end all wars," or the "Great War," as it was originally called) on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918. In the U.S., it is known as Veterans Day, although it is a worldwide event. Other countries celebrate it as Armistice Day and/or Remembrance Day. It is a day dedicated to world peace.

Please remember it is NOT Veteran's or Veterans' Day, but Veterans Day.  It's a day that belong to those brave souls, living and dead who have served their country.

Veterans Day was first celebrated on Nov. 11, 1919, the first anniversary of the end of World War I. The day's observation included parades and public gatherings, as well as a brief pause in business activities at 11 a.m. On November 11, 1921, an unidentified American soldier killed in the war was buried at Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, D.C. As an aside, unidentified soldiers were laid to rest that same day at Westminster Abbey in London and at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. The U.S. Congress passed a resolution in 1926 calling the date an annual observance, and Nov. 11 became a national holiday beginning in 1938.

A brief visit to the web site of the United States Department of Veterans Affairs notes:

• In 1954, President Eisenhower officially changed the name of the holiday from Armistice Day to Veterans Day. This was so veterans of WWII could be honored, too.
• In 1968, the Uniform Holidays Bill was passed by Congress, which moved the celebration of Veterans Day to the fourth Monday in October. The law went into effect in 1971, but in 1975 President Ford returned Veterans Day to November 11, due to the important historical significance of the date.
• Britain, France, Australia and Canada also commemorate the veterans of World Wars I and II on or near November 11th: Canada has Remembrance Day (sometimes referred to as Poppy Day), while Britain has Remembrance Sunday (the second Sunday of November). In Europe, (Britain and the Commonwealth countries) it is common to observe two minutes of silence at 11 a.m. every November 11.
• Although it is considered a National holiday, in actuality, there are no U.S. national holidays because the states retain the right to designate their own, and the government can only designate holidays for federal employees and for the District of Columbia. In practice, however, states almost always follow the federal lead.

(courtesy of the office of the Dept. of Veteran Affairs)

Please don't forget veterans today.  They gave everything they had for their country, and their country, my country has not treated them fairly upon their return.    The suicide rate far outnumbers that of any other class of people, including teens.  I read a report that 22 veterans die each day from suicide.  This can be due to not getting the proper care they deserve, or slipping through the cracks.

We asked them to go to war, wars we started or kept alive, and when they came home damaged, battered, bruised, crushed, jobless, and often homeless due to our fractured system, we didn't keep our promise to them after they kept their promise to us.  So PLEASE hug a veteran today, no matter what country you are visiting from!

Today is Day 11 of AEDM and I celebrated Veterans Day with a history lesson and a poster offered by the United States Veterans Administration.