Gorham’s Memorial Day Parade will step off from Village School at 11 a.m. on Monday, May 29. The parade will turn right onto South Street and then right onto Main Street and will end at the Eastern Cemetery where there will be a memorial service. Groups who wish to march in the parade are asked to register at https://gorhamrec.com and be ready to line up at Village School at 10 a.m.
Groups in attendance include our Recreation baseball and softball teams, Knights of Columbus, our local color guard, Gorham Police and Fire, Gorham Public Works, Wyman’s Bee Mobile, many of our local churches, various local businesses and so many more. The speaker at the memorial service will be Col Bill Benson USA, retired.
Photo credit: Anonymous; From the collection of Wilma JohnsonMemorial Day Parade of Girl Scouts on Main Street circa 1930’s.
The first Memorial Day ceremony in the U.S. to honor fallen Union Civil War soldiers was held on May 1, 1865, when 10,000 mostly freed slaves along with members of the 54th Massachusetts and other Black Union regiments and white missionaries gathered in Charleston, South Carolina to honor the fallen. The Uniform Monday Holiday Act moved Memorial Day from May 30 to the last Monday in May.
Customarily, the American flag marks Memorial Day by flying at half-staff from sunrise until noon, then at full staff until sundown to honor the fallen soldiers of all wars.
The National Moment of Remembrance Act was signed by President Bill Clinton and takes place at 3 p.m. local time each Memorial Day asking the public to pause for a minute of silence to remember and honor the sacrifices of those who have given their lives for our country.
Memorial Day celebrations and military burials also include the playing of “Taps,” written in 1862 by General Daniel Butterfield, a wounded Union brigadier general from New York. He served as Assistant Secretary of the U. S. Treasury and is buried at West Point Cemetery.
The land that became Arlington National Cemetery was a plantation belonging to Robert E. Lee and originally belonging to George Washington’s step-grandson, George Washington Parke Custis. For more than 14,000 soldiers, Arlington is their final resting place. The Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery was established in 1921, and has been a final resting place for unidentified World War I service members, and from later wars added in 1958 and 1984.