AF-656: The History of Presidents’ Day | Ancestral Findings Podcast

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day is a holiday celebrated in february and usually means a day off from work or school for many people. It is also closely associated with retail sales, as many companies hold a special sale that day, but what is the

history

of this federal holiday and what it means for the country's President's Day is in February and most Americans probably know very little about what this federal holiday is and why we celebrate it. It is a day off for most government institutions and offices. and usually the banks are closed on President's Day too, you'll probably also see a lot of ads on store TV proclaiming President's Day sales, it's a big shopping day because of all the people who have the day off from work However, President's Day is more than just a day off and a reason to shop at a discount.

This is the real story behind President's Day in the United States. President's Day was not originally known by this name in its form. It was initially known as Washington's Birthday and was a day set aside to celebrate our first American president, George Washington, born on February 22, 1732. The nation's official celebration of his birthday occurred between the 15th and the 21st. February of each year, depending on when the weekends and other important events on the federal calendar were. The original federal holiday. Honoring George Washington was devised by an act of Congress in 1879; It was originally intended to be observed only by the federal offices in Washington D.C, but was expanded to include all federal offices in the country in 1885.

It was the first holiday to honor an American president and was initially always celebrated on the actual birthday of Washington on February 22. This changed on January 1, 1971 with the Uniform Monday Holiday Law which changed the holiday to fall between the dates it is officially celebrated today. The holiday now always falls on the third Monday in February. States began wanting to celebrate the birthdays of individual

presidents

, and some states started holidays for Lincoln's birthday, Jefferson's birthday, and for the office of the president in general, to bring all of these individual celebrations together into one national holiday. In 1951 a committee was formed to investigate it.

It was called President's Day, the National Congressional Committee was set to celebrate the birthdays of Washington and Lincoln, as well as the President's own office, but thought that these holidays would be so close together, which would have included Inauguration Day, which It was in March at the time, it was too heavy for the federal calendar, so the idea of ​​a federal President's Day was scrapped, this means that the holiday we celebrate on the third Monday in February is still officially called Washington's Birthday; However, in the mid-1980s, advertisers began referring to the holiday as Presidents' Day across the country and the name was unofficially adopted by the public, even appearing as such on most U.S. calendars.

In the US, while the federal government only officially celebrates Washington's birthday, although most of the nation calls it President's Day, most individual states also have their own presidential celebrations, usually for Lincoln, but a times for jefferson and even others, the vast majority of these states have incorporated these celebrations into the general framework of presidents day so that they can take advantage of the federal holiday and not have to have several separate state holidays near the federal, california, connecticut, Missouri and Illinois are currently the only states to have a separate official state holiday for Lincoln's birthday, although many states name other presidents besides Washington in the official celebration of President's Day, which falls on the same day as the federal holiday until In the 1980s, most businesses remained closed to observe Presidents' Day and cut Washington's birthday short.

However, as more corporate businesses realized that this was a great day to earn extra income by having sales, they began to stay open and the holiday became increasingly commercial. It's similar to Memorial Day and Valentine's Day, where people expect big sales at most stores and do a lot. additional expense unlike Valentine's Day, although most people do not exchange President's Day cards, this is actually in keeping with the idea of ​​the Uniform Monday Holiday Act of 1971. Congress wanted to move all federal holidays to Mondays to promote business and commerce, and some schools used to do so. They close only for one day to celebrate Presidents Day, they drastically reduce Washington's birthday and some still do it, however instead of having a single holiday in February and then a week off in March for spring break, many schools are now waiving the day off for Presidents' Day or moving the spring break dates back to February and the addition of Presidents' Day to school vacations of spring break week varies from state to state and even from one individual school district to another because the defunct military Purple Heart award was revived on Washington's 200th birthday in 1932.

It is sometimes used. as a holiday for the awarding of this prestigious medal, either at the federal level or at individual military posts, while most areas of the nation have no official community celebrations for Presidents' Day, slash Washington's birthday, His hometown in Alexandria, Virginia, lives up to the month. long George celebrations, including the world's longest and most elaborate George Washington parade. Washington's home in Mount Vernon hosts festivities throughout his birthday weekend, and this is also done at Washington's Birthplace National Monument in Westmoreland County, Virginia, and a few other isolated locations in the area. nation. They have their own unique celebrations, such as Denver Colorado and Eustis Florida, while it has traditionally been spelled President's Day in the past because the apostrophe was supposed to indicate the celebration of a President Washington, many states and companies now refer to it as the President's Day without the apostrophe indicating a celebration of more than one or all presidents; in fact, the Associated Press stylebook now prefers the use of President's Day with the apostrophe at the end.

There has been a tradition since 1862 to read Washington's farewell address to the nation in Congress and aloud. In some communities celebrating the holiday on this day it was started because of the civil war and the idea was that Washington's words could help unite the country again. Thank you very much for listening and subscribing to the

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