Daily Herald opinion: Memorial Day’s true mission: We have a duty to remember veterans who made the ultimate sacrifice
Memorial Day weekend typically kicks off summer with pool openings, art fairs, barbecues and patriotic parades. But it’s important to remember why Monday was set aside as a national holiday in the first place: to honor veterans who gave their lives for our country.
Memorial Day, originally known as Decoration Day, dates back to 1868 when, post Civil War, Americans would decorate the graves of soldiers killed in service. A federal holiday was established in 1971.
It’s been more than 150 years since local Civil War veterans fighting with the Union Army were first honored. But we honor them still, along with those lost in other wars.
That’s why the work of Vern Paddock and Brian Maloney is so poignant and inspiring.
As Mick Zawislak reported in Wednesday’s newspaper, Paddock is a retiree with a passion for genealogy and research. He volunteers his time to clean gravestones that date back more than 175 years at Volo Cemetery in Lake County.
Research revealed 11 Civil War veterans at Volo Cemetery, and Paddock along with his friend Ken Regner, got permission from Wauconda Township to clear more than a century of grime and lichen from the worn and weathered gravestones.
Paddock has identified veterans elsewhere as well and makes it a point for the past five years to honor their resting places with American flags on Memorial Day and Veterans Day.
In Arlington Heights, history buff Brian Maloney discovered nine Civil War veterans from the community not previously known to local historians.
Bricks honoring the men were placed at Memorial Park this spring, and their names will be included for the first time in a remembrance ceremony Monday in Arlington Heights, Chris Placek reports.
The work of local historians such as Maloney and Paddock helps keep the lives and service of local veterans in mind long after loved ones are gone as well.
Indeed, even veterans lost in later wars — World War I, World War II, the Korean War, Vietnam and the Gulf wars — lose family members and friends over time who once visited their graves, leaving flowers, flags or stones.
As generations pass, veterans might otherwise be lost to history without dedicated Americans who continue to remember their sacrifice.
We should be a part of that important effort in some way.
We can do so by volunteering to help organizations honoring veterans, by attending Memorial Day services over the weekend, by cheering veterans marching in local parades, by thanking vets we encounter and by offering prayers or words of remembrance for those who are no longer with us.
These men and women fought on the battlefields of our nation as well as the seas, skies, fields and towns of places far from our suburban homes. They deserve our respect and our remembrance.