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Special Events and National Holidays

Everybody likes a good day off now and then, but few really appreciate why we have them. Improving your knowledge of special events and the history behind each not only improves your knowledge but it may also enhance your enjoyment of them.

Calendar of National Special Events
The US has 10 federal holidays by law. While some are set according to a specific date, others are assigned a day of the month so that Americans get a three-day holiday weekend.

Those set by date are:

• New Year’s Day
• Independence Day
• Veterans Day
• Christmas Day.

Holidays designed to give us a three-day weekend include:

• Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Birthday
• Washington's Birthday
• Memorial Day
• Labor Day
• Columbus Day
• Thanksgiving.

Improving Your Knowledge of Holidays
When it comes to learning more about our social and cultural heritage, understanding modern holiday traditions is key. If you are looking to improve your knowledge of why or how particular traditions came into practice, you can buy books on the holiday, watch TV specials or read up on the history of pagan traditions.

In general, learning about how traditions come into widespread practice can add more meaning and depth into your annual practice of them.

How a National Holiday or Special Event Comes to Be
Holidays like Thanksgiving, Mother’s Day and Father’s Day are generally the result of a presidential or some other authority figure's public declaration. For example, while President Nixon officially declared Mother’s Day to be a holiday in 1972, George Washington established Thanksgiving, and later Abraham Lincoln declared it an annual holiday in 1863. Generally, a formal proclamation is really the last step in getting a special event or national holiday declared.

The most crucial element in getting a special event or national holiday to be a formal declaration is the tradition behind it. In fact, many holidays are a combination of various cultural traditions. For example:

• Christmas may be commemorating the Birth of Christ, but it has its roots in early Christians trying to incorporate pagan traditions. Modern use of the Christmas Tree and mistletoe are symbols of early pagan traditions.

• Easter is another example of Christian missionaries adapting pagan beliefs. Many Anglo-Saxon tribes celebrated a feast to Eostre, a pagan god clearly tied into the naming of the holiday. The rabbit and the egg are also leftover symbols from this pagan time.

In each of the above examples, the holiday is unrelated to presidential declarations. Both Christmas and Easter have and continue to hold strong roots in social tradition. However, while a holiday can't come into popular celebration without a strong tradition, it takes years before tradition becomes a special event or national holiday. For example, it took years before Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday accepted as a holiday.