Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 121, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 May 1918 — MEMORIAL DAY [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

MEMORIAL DAY

What It Mean* On May 5, 1868, Gen. John A. Logan, commander-in-chief of the Grand Army of the Republic, proclaimed the first Memorial Day for May 30 of that year in the folloiwdng words: , , _ “We must cherish tenderly the memory of our heroic dead who made their breasts a barricade for our country. Their soldier lives were the reveille of freedom to a race in chains. We must guard their graves with sacred vigilance. Let no vandalism or neglect, no ravages of time testify that we have forgotten, as a people, the cost of an undivided republic. Let us gather around their sacred remains and garland the passionless mounds above them .with the choicest flowers of springtime, and let us raise above them the flag they saved.”