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  • National Freedom Day?

    From Ross Clark@21:1/5 to All on Sat Feb 1 21:34:50 2025
    While changing the month on a recycled calendar (2014), my eye chanced
    to light on February 1, marked "National Freedom Day, USA". What? Never
    heard of it. It's not mentioned on the 2025 calendar which started this
    whole project.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Freedom_Day

    Wiki says it's a United States "observance"...a careful choice of words?
    The event commemorated is clear: Lincoln's signing (1/2/1865) of the
    joint House and Senate resolution which eventually became the 13th
    Amendment, abolishing slavery.

    It originated with a campaign by Major Richard Robert Wright, Sr.
    (1855-1947), born into slavery and freed after the Civil War, for a day
    "when freedom for all Americans is celebrated". It was proclaimed by
    President Truman in 1948.

    So why did I never hear of it? (I lived in the USA for 7 years, and have
    never been very far from hearing and reading about it.)

    Clues in the Wiki article: "The President may issue each year a
    proclamation designating February 1 as National Freedom Day..."
    "may"...or may not. Sounds like it's on a one-year contract.

    "On this day, many towns and cities have festivals...Some citizens
    reflect privately on the freedoms....It is not a federal holiday."

    So it just faded from lack of interest? Or was it superseded by Juneteenth?

    What experience have other people had of it?

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Aidan Kehoe@21:1/5 to All on Sat Feb 1 11:21:22 2025
    Ar an chéad lá de mí Feabhra, scríobh Ross Clark:

    [...] What experience have other people had of it?

    Never heard of it, but of course I’m not an estadounidense and have less direct
    experience of the US than you do. I suppose the only useful answers that differ from this will be from US citizens.

    --
    ‘As I sat looking up at the Guinness ad, I could never figure out /
    How your man stayed up on the surfboard after fourteen pints of stout’
    (C. Moore)

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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  • From Stefan Ram@21:1/5 to Ross Clark on Sat Feb 1 13:02:58 2025
    Ross Clark <[email protected]> wrote or quoted:
    While changing the month on a recycled calendar (2014), my eye chanced
    to light on February 1, marked "National Freedom Day, USA". What? Never
    heard of it.

    I've got this collection of calendar dates here, and I keep
    stumbling across these off-the-wall commemorative days and
    giving them the cold shoulder (though I'm not always sure if
    they're as out there in their home turf). For instance:

    MMDD
    0104 National Trivia Day
    0116 National Nothing Day
    0120 Reindeer Day
    0123 National Handwriting Day
    0126 Australia Day
    0206 New Zealand Day
    . . .
    0915 Felt Hat Day, when men of fashion put away their straw hats.
    . . .

    , and let's not forget:

    0402 Doris Day (1924)

    . /Tomorrow/ however, is a real day: It's Groundhog day!

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