The story of Memorial Day – which, along with Labor Day, has become a government proclaimed three-day weekend, with both bookending the summer tourist season – has evolved over the years, with events that took place 100 years ago changing it forever. The story begins in 1867 in the aftermath of the Civil War. A prominent Philadelphia woman wrote a letter to Gen. John A. Logan, commander of the newly formed Grand Army of the Republic, a powerful veterans organization of Union Army veterans.
In the “spring of 1867, Mr. and Mrs. Henry S. Kimball of West Philadelphia, Pa., were visiting several points in the…
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