HOLIDAYS: More than a number

I do not celebrate the Fourth of July. I also do not celebrate the 25th of December, the 11th of November, the 14th of June, or the 14th of February.

However, I do celebrate Independence Day, Christmas, Veterans Day, Flag Day, and St. Valentine’s Day. This difference may seem trivial to you, but if you take away the proper name of a holiday, the meaning of the day erodes and eventually disappears.

Case in point: Many people stateside celebrate Cinco de Mayo, believing it to be Mexico’s Independence Day. Actually, the day commemorates the Mexican Army’s victory over the French Empire at the Battle of Puebla in 1862.

Totally removing the names of holidays was recently tried on the East Coast. According to The New York Post, the school board in Randolph Township, Morris County, N.J., on Thursday, June 10 voted to replace the names of holidays on the academic calendar with the term “days off.”

The students would no longer know why they don’t have school on a particular day, just that they have the day off. Eventually, the meaning would disappear and no one would remember why they got the day off. Thankfully, four days later the school board reversed this controversial decision.

Independence Day, the celebration of the date the United States declared itself independent of the United Kingdom, is too important an event to give it a nickname. Let’s all remember the reason for this holiday. Happy 245th birthday, United States of America! Happy Independence Day to us all!

YVETTE JOHNSON BENHAM

Plummer