My Grandmother never called the holiday we’re currently celebrating in the United States, “Memorial Day.” For her, it was always, “Decoration Day.”

“Nanny,” as we all called her, arrived in the winter of 1911. To put that in a bit of perspective, the young men of 17 or 18 years of age when they fought in the Civil War hadn’t yet turned 65 years old when she was born. She remembered as a child talking with veterans who had fought at the battles we’ve only read of in history books.

Decoration Day started after the Civil War, when people would place flags on the graves of those who had fought and died for the Union or Confederacy. The date of late May was chosen because there were no significant battles fought on that day – meaning the remembrance wouldn’t be focused on any particular encounter or specific group of soldiers.

As History.com reports, “The Civil War, which ended in the spring of 1865, claimed more lives than any conflict in U.S. history and required the establishment of the country’s first national cemeteries. By the late 1860s, Americans in various towns and cities had begun holding springtime tributes to these countless fallen soldiers, decorating their graves with flowers and reciting prayers.”

An early memory of mine is going with Nanny to our cemetery in our hometown of Crothersville, Indiana, to place small flags with wooden sticks in the ground by the graves of soldiers her family had known that had fought in conflicts over many years.

Gradually, as more conflicts ensued and wars battled, Decoration Day for Civil War soldiers lost became known as Memorial Day for all soldiers who gave the ultimate sacrifice in all wars.

As we remember those who served and gave all they had, let us respect the tradition of Decoration Day…now, Memorial Day.

And, let us be reminded that sometimes it is appropriate for traditions to evolve, grow, and change.

That’s not to advocate “change for change’s sake” – it’s to say that as life and times move forward, we must as well.

Nanny used to say, “When you’re green, you’re growing. But, when you’re ripe it means you’ve started to rot.”

 I hope that “green and growing”/learning and advancing analogy will consistently be applicable for you and I – as well as the organizations and nations we respectively represent.