It began first to honor Union soldiers who died during the American Civil War. After World War I, it expanded to include those who died in any war or military action. One of the longest standing traditions is the running of the Indianapolis 500, which has been held in conjunction with Memorial Day since 1911 (no one has been able to successfully explain the connection between honoring the nation's war dead and people driving around a race track).
Here is your Today in History -
Happy Towel day (remember a towel is "about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitch hiker can have") -
so don't panic.
May 25, 1521 -
Charles V, a Holy Roman Emperor (Who was neither holy or a Roman - he was just a German King) issues the Diet of Worms.
Martin Luther, German monk and all around killjoy, couldn't stomach this diet (as it declaring him an outlaw for not eating worms, banning his writings, and requiring his arrest) and goes off to start the Protestant Reformation.
May 25 1803 -
Ralph Waldo Emerson was born on this date. Emerson whose original profession, a Unitarian minister but secret calling was as, an amateur plumber, left the ministry to pursue a career in writing and public speaking.
Emerson became one of America's best known and best loved 19th century figures, writing such works as "Self-Reliance and the indoor toilet" and "Bacchus on the chamber pot".
May 25, 1895 -
British playwright and novelist Oscar Wilde is convicted of "committing acts of gross indecency with other male persons," to wit: buggering some rent boys.
For his crime, Wilde is sentenced to two years of hard labor in Reading jail. Perhaps, he should have taken up gardening instead.
May 25, 1925 -
John Scopes was indicted for teaching evolution in school. Evolution was a theory put forth by Charles Darwin, whose boat was named "the Beagle." People objected to this theory, which put forth the proposition that mankind had evolved from life forms with hairy red asses.
This resulted in the famous Scopes Monkey Trial, in which Spencer Tracy gave a long monologue that changed everyone's minds even though it was so darn hot in the courtroom.
It is now commonly accepted as fact that mankind evolved from life forms with hairy red asses, a proposition that anyone who's been to the beach lately shouldn't find too hard to accept.
May 25, 1977 -
In a time long ago and in a galaxy far, far away, George Lucas began legally printing money with the release of the first Star Wars movie, which for reasons only know to George was titled - Stars War IV: A New Hope.
Yes, we are old.
May 25, 1996 -
The body of Bradley Nowell is discovered in his room at San Francisco's Ocean View Motel.
Nowell, lead singer for radio trio Sublime, was killed by an accidental smack overdose.
May 25, 2001 -
Erik Weihenmayer is the first blind person to reach the summit of Mount Everest, on this date. He also completed the Seven Summits in September 2002. His story was covered in a Time article in June 2001 titled Blind Faith.
He is author of Touch the Top of the World: A Blind Man's Journey to Climb Farther Than the Eye can See, his autobiography. Some of you reading this actually have actual met and know him. Small world.
And so it goes
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