OVER half of Americans don’t know what Memorial Day is, according to new research.
The shocking data was revealed in a new survey of 2,000 Americans, which found that only 48% of respondents knew why Memorial Day is a holiday.
Thirty-five percent of the panelists incorrectly thought Memorial Day was a holiday celebrating all military personnel, both living and deceased.
This, of course, is actually Veterans Day.
Intriguingly, 5% mistakenly believed it was a holiday honoring all public servants, including non-military personnel, who died in the line of duty.
Do you know the real meaning?
It is, of course, honoring military personnel who died in service to their country.
When splitting out the results of the data by generation, there seems to be a divide amongst age groups.
Older generations, by and large, were far more likely to know the exact definition of Memorial Day when compared to younger Americans.
Only 27% of Gen Z respondents selected the correct definition, as well as just 38% ofmillennials.
Baby boomers were most on top of it, with 56% knowing precisely why Memorial Day was observed.
But just because you don’t know exactly what Memorial Day is, doesn’t mean you have to work on the unofficial start of summer.
Of employed survey respondents, 65% have the day off from their job, while 35% will still be heading into work.
It comes after a similar survey revealed two out of three Americans don’t know the true meaning of Independence Day.
When questioned about the official meaning of the Fourth of July, merely 59 percent correctly identified it as “The signing of the Declaration of Independence.”
Although 41 percent got the question wrong, 22 percent came close, choosing “The establishment of the United States as an independent nation.”
Why do we observe Memorial Day?
To honor military personnel who died in service to their country – 48%
To honor all military veterans, both living and deceased – 35%
To remember all public servants who lost their lives while working – 5%
To commemorate the Founding Fathers and their role in American independence – 3%
To honor past presidents who served in the military. 2%
Likewise, only 45 percent knew the correct year of the first organized Independence Day celebration: 1777, a year subsequent to the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776.
“At night there was a grand exhibition of fireworks (which began and concluded with thirteen rockets) on the Commons, and the city was beautifully illuminated,” The Pennsylvania Evening Post reported of the event.
Where the rest of the survey was concerned, however, many respondents did well in their understanding of US history and Civics, answering a series of questions that are often used in the US Citizenship Test.
A whopping 82 percent correctly answered that the Commander in Chief of the military is the president, and a similar percentage (82 percent) identified the Star Spangled Banner as the title of the national anthem.
But some basic civics lessons still eluded those polled; for example, only 65 percent knew that there are nine members of the Supreme Court, which is currently in session.
Another 40 percent didn’t know that the “right to bear arms” is a part of the second amendment rather than the first – and 11 percent mistakenly believed that “freedom of speech” was not part of the first amendment at all.
Prior to the test, only 61 percent claimed to be very knowledgeable about US history.
At the end 73 percent believed they got either most or all of the questions correct, suggesting that they were more confident in their abilities after the test.
