Memorial Day is this coming Monday. A teacher at my school is serving in Iraq right now, and over a webcam or something, will lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance tomorrow. Also, my homeroom, Reading/LA, and Social Studies teacher served in the Air Force. Many people have given their lives for our country, so if you would like to say some words, please do so here. Here are mine:
Many men and women have died fighting for their country, our country. Some have given up more than that. A perfect example is the Gettysburg National Cemetery. There are countless markers of "Unknown Zouave" or "Unknown Soldier". These men gave up everything; their possesions, their families, and also who they were. These people truly gave their last full measure of devotion for their country, and their cause. In the bloodiest day in American history, over 17,000 men died fighting at Antietam Creek in Maryland in 1862. Not all of these individual men will be remembered, but what they did will always be remembered. We honor them for just that on Monday. To close, read Lincoln's Gettysburg Address for a good embodiement of my point.
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Note: I did not type the Gettysburg Address, I copy-pasted from this site:
http://showcase.netins.net/web/creative/lincoln/speeches/gettysburg.htm
Also, this song is good for Memorial Day: www.scratch.mit.edu/ext/youtube/?v=RtmFQLhQ1nY
Listen to it while reading what I said, it's quite interesting.
Last edited by gettysburg11 (2009-05-21 19:23:15)
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lol cause if you typed that i'd laugh.
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By this, I meant the G-burg Address, I'll go edit that.
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