The Wisdom Bridge
Illuminate Your Life
Dignity Days: Inspirations of the Month
From work-in-progress Dignity Days: A Calendar of Inspiring People and Events
From Around the World and Throughout the Year
Entries have been selected for your use in talks and personal messages.
May
1 International Labor Day, established in 1891 to commemorate the tragic violence of the 1886 Haymarket demonstration in Chicago, a national holiday in 80 countries and honored in many others. In the U.S. and Canada the date was moved to the first Monday in September in order to avoid association with the Haymarket bloodshed and weaken citizens’ awareness of decades of pro-labor work accomplished by communists.
1 Lei Day, Hawai’i, established in 1929, celebrates each island’s special flower as tangible representations of aloha, the breath of love.
2 Theodor Herzl birthday, 1860, founder of the modern Zionist movement that led to the establishment of the State of Israel, emblematic of all peoples’ desire for sanctuary.
3 World Press Freedom Day, a UNESCO celebration of the importance of a free press.
c 6 Vesak (Buddha Day), commemorates the birth, enlightenment and death of the Buddha, and his indestructible message of peace through spiritual/psychological freedom.
9 Elizabeth (Lizzie) Magie birthday, 1866, originator of the board game Monopoly. After reading the work of progressive economist Henry George, she invented The Landlord’s Game to teach people about economic inequality.
9 Kermit the Frog television debut, 1955, on the Washington, DC program ”Sam and Friends.” Kermit went on to appear in the early 1960s humor program “That Was the Week That Was,” “Sesame Street,” “The Muppet Show” and several movies. He is most famous for his rendering of the song “It’s Not Easy Being Green” which he often sang in gentle solidarity with those struggling for racial justice. Kermit even did a TED talk, “The Creative Act of Listening to a Talking Frog,” in which he discusses creativity, optimism, beginner’s mind and the creative luminaries Sir Ken Robinson and Ken Wilber.
10 Yick Wo, on this date in 1886, won, with the help of the whole Chinese community of San Francisco, a U.S. Supreme Court decision that set precedent for equal protection under law. His laundry business had been denied an operating license purely on racial grounds though the law itself was non-discriminatory. The court found that unequal enforcement is as unacceptable as unequal law, violating the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
10 Cecelia Payne birthday, 1900, discovered that stars are mainly hydrogen and helium, and can be classified by their temperatures. She brought us the idea that hydrogen is both the simplest and the most abundant element in the universe.
12 Florence Nightingale birthday, 1820, pioneering British nurse and statistician whose efforts, organizational skills and insights saved thousands of lives during the Crimean War and whose writings transformed medical care thereafter. The “Lady with the Lamp.”
c 12 World Fair Trade Day, second Saturday in May. Supporting fair trade relations and economic freedom for people of color and women worldwide.
15 Diane Judith Nash birthday, 1938, American civil rights activist based in Nashville, Tennessee, a leader and strategist of the Civil Rights Movement for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. She was also crucial to the success of the Freedom Rides sponsored by the Congress of Racial Equality.
15 L. Frank Baum birthday, 1856, creator of the land of Oz. Like all people, he was not perfect. In 2020, the press acknowledged his racist attitudes toward Indigenous Americans, Asians and Black people.
15 International Conscientious Objector Day. Commemorating those who insist upon the right not to kill.
15 International Day of Families, established by the United Nations General Assembly in 1993.
25 Africa Day, commemorates the 1963 founding of the Organization of African Unity, promoting freedom from colonialism and appreciation of African cooperation.
25 Ralph Waldo Emerson birthday, 1803. Essayist, speaker and leader of American Transcendentalism who taught self-reliance through awareness of our individual soul’s essential connection to the souls of all others and to the Over-Soul, his term for Spirit or Universal Intelligence. Following one’s own life journey requires distinguishing between the guidance of the soul and the shallower urgings of the ego. Like all people, he was not perfect. In 2020, the press acknowledged his racist attitudes toward Indigenous Americans and Black people. Unfortunately, his status as America’s most often read philosopher spread his racist ideas far and wide.
27 Amelia Bloomer birthday, 1818, U.S. women’s rights and temperance activist who started a newspaper, The Lily. She is best remembered for her championing of looser, freer clothing for women; ‘bloomers’ (loose pants worn under somewhat shorter skirts and loose-waist tops) in the era of pinch-waist whalebone corsets and floor length skirts, freeing the movement and internal organs of those who dared wear them.
27 Julia Ward Howe birthday, 1819, author of the 1870 Mother’s Day Proclamation calling for a women’s campaign for peace. Best known for writing the poem “Battle Hymn of the Republic.” The Proclamation was taken up by Ann Jarvis (see September 30) in her efforts to promote social welfare and later her daughter Anna. Eventually the peace and justice focus was lost and the day became simply a way to honor mothers.
27 Rachel Carson birthday, 1907, marine biologist and conservationist who warned the world of the dangers of pesticides such as DDT in the ground-breaking book Silent Spring and wrote movingly about the world’s oceans in The Sea Around Us and other works.
28 Jim Thorpe birthday, 1888, member of the Sauk and Fox Nation, first American Indian Olympic Gold Medal winner, (pentathlon and triathlon, 1912). Talented in many sports, Thorpe was stripped of his medals in 1013 for having played semi-pro baseball, his only source of income at the time. His medals were restored in 1983.
30 U.S. Memorial Day, originally observed on various dates North and South as Decoration Day, to honor the military dead of the Civil War, established on May 30, 1868 by the Grand Army of the Republic, the organization for Union Civil War veterans. The first known observance took place May 1, 1865 in Charleston, South Carolina, organized by freed African Americans people. The former Charleston Race Course still held the dead Union soldiers who had been prisoners of war there. Freedmen established the Martyrs of the Race Course burial ground, moved the bodies and lanscaped the area. Nearly ten thousand people, mostly freedmen, gathered on May 1 to commemorate the dead. Involved were 3,000 schoolchildren newly enrolled in freedmen's schools, mutual aid societies, Union troops, black ministers and white Northern missionaries.