Happy 4th of July!

HAPPY 4th OF JULY!!!!

Yesterday is my most favorite day of the year. There is something about the 4th of July that just makes me smile from the moment I get up until I fall asleep at night.

I think a lot of it has to do with growing up in the town I did. The week leading up to the 4th of July is "Family Festival" in my hometown. Every day or night for one week there are events throughout the different neighborhoods celebrating the town, the residents and the summer season. It all culminates on the 4th with the Back Bay Parade filled with families, children and pets of all kinds in costumes and homemade floats galore!

Until I was 10 years old my family lived less than a block away from where the town fireworks were set off. Over the years Danver became known for the fireworks display and it now draws people from all over Massachusetts into our sleepy little town. My cousins lived (and still do) right around the corner from us and every year they would have a huge BBQ that included our entire extended family, friends and neighbors. It was full of children of all ages, and even a pony ride one year. After eating tons of food we'd all walk down to the park together to stake out our spot on the field. There was nothing throughout the year that could compare to that day. 

As we got older, my cousins and I started going our own ways, we'd attend friends parties instead of our own and the celebration became different. In high school I'd spend the night with a large group of classmates at the field avoiding my family at all costs. It's been about 7 years since I've actually been down to the field where all the action is but I'm hoping next year we'll be able to bring the nugget with us! He'll be 10 months by then so maybe we'll be able to start our own tradition! 

I do however, think that sometimes people forget what National Holidays are really about. Most people look forward to them because it means a day off from work or school, but there is so much more to it than that. Our Independence Day should be about celebrating our freedom and the continued fight for that freedom. It recognizes our Independence from England and the birth of our own country! Sometimes just taking a moment to reflect on that and appreciate it is really all you need to do. Who knows what life would be like if we'd never been free! We all (myself included) tend to take for granted the liberties and opportunities we've been granted by our forefathers.

I am truly proud to be an American.


Here are some interesting facts about Independence Day:

• In 1777, thirteen gunshots were fired in salute, once at morning and once again as evening fell, on July 4 in Bristol, Rhode Island.
• Also in 1777, Philadelphia celebrated the first anniversary in a manner a modern American would find quite familiar: an official dinner for the Continental Congress, toasts, 13-gun salutes, speeches, prayers, music, parades, troop reviews, and fireworks. Ships were decked with red, white, and blue bunting.
• In 1778, General George Washington marked July 4 with a double ration of rum for his soldiers and an artillery salute. Across the Atlantic Ocean, ambassadors John Adams and Benjamin Franklin held a dinner for their fellow Americans in Paris, France.
• In 1779, July 4 fell on a Sunday. The holiday was celebrated on Monday, July 5.
• In 1781 the Massachusetts General Court became the first state legislature to recognize July 4 as a state celebration.
• In 1783, Moravians in Salem, North Carolina, held a celebration of July 4 with a challenging music program assembled by Johann Friedrich Peter. This work was titled "The Psalm of Joy".
• In 1791 the first recorded use of the name "Independence Day" occurred.
• In 1820 the first Fourth of July celebration was held in Eastport, Maine which remains the largest in the state.
• In 1826 Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both died on July 4
• In 1870, the U.S. Congress made Independence Day an unpaid holiday for federal employees
• In 1938, Congress changed Independence Day to a paid federal holiday.

Unique/Historical Celebrations

• Held since 1785, the Bristol Fourth of July Parade in Bristol, Rhode Island is the oldest continuous Independence Day celebration in the United States.
• Since 1868, Seward, Nebraska has held a celebration on the same town square. In 1979 Seward was designated “America's Official Fourth of July City-Small Town USA” by resolution of Congress. Seward has also been proclaimed Nebraska's Official Fourth of July City” by Governor James Exon in proclamation. Seward is a town of 6,000 but swells to 40,000+ during the July 4 celebrations.
• Since 1916, Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest in Coney Island, Brooklyn, New York City supposedly started as a way to settle a dispute among four immigrants as to who was the most patriotic.
• Since 1959, the International Freedom Festival is jointly held in Detroit, Michigan and Windsor, Ontario during the last week of June each year as a mutual celebration of Independence Day and Canada Day (July 1). It culminates in a large fireworks display over the Detroit River.
• Numerous major and minor league baseball games are played on Independence Day.
• The famous Macy's fireworks display usually held over the East River in New York City has been televised nationwide on NBC since 1976. In 2009, the fireworks display was returned to the Hudson River for the first time since 2000 to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson's exploration of that river.
• Since 1970, the annual 10 kilometer Peachtree Road Race is held in Atlanta, Georgia.
• The Boston Pops Orchestra has hosted a music and fireworks show over the Charles River Esplanade called the "Boston Pops Fireworks Spectacular" annually since 1973. The event was broadcast nationally from 1987 until 2002 on A&E, and from 2003 until 2012 on CBS (who aired the final hour of the event in prime time). In 2013, CBS dropped the Pops broadcast, with no reason given; however, executive producer David G. Mugar believed that an encore presentation of the Macy's fireworks on NBC aired at 10:00 PM ET/PT was successfully counter programming the Boston Pops, since the broadcast lost as much as 20% of its audience in 2012 in comparison to 2011. As it did prior to the cancellation, the full concert continues to air locally by Boston's CBS affiliate WBZ-TV.
• On the Capitol lawn in Washington, D.C., "A Capitol Fourth", a free concert, precedes the fireworks and attracts over half a million people annually.