Monday, April 20, 2020, is Patriots' (plural possessive) Day in Massachusetts and Patriot's (singular possessive) Day in Maine. In a normal year state and local government offices and many businesses in Massachusetts and Maine would be closed. This year -- well it's just day 28 of the ban on gatherings of 10 or more persons. Patriots' Day is also the date of the running of the Boston Marathon. According to Runners World: "The Boston Marathon was first run in 1897, making it the oldest annual marathon in the world. Since it started, the Boston Marathon has never been fully canceled, except in 1918 when a marathon military relay was run instead. The race was stopped in 2013 when two bombs were detonated at the finish line." This year's race has been rescheduled for September 14, 2020.
Check out this video WE WOOL WIN from the Woolmark Company highlighting why for many marathon runners wool is the fiber of choice.
"Listen, my children and you shall hear
of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five."
"You know the rest. In the books you have read,
How the British Regulars fired and fled--"
And that morning of April 19 officially marks the beginning of the American War of Independence. In Massachusetts and Maine (part of Massachusetts until 1820, when, under the "Missouri Compromise" Maine, a free State was admitted to the Union, paired with Missouri, a slave State) we celebrate it as Patriots'/Patriot's Day, and, like Revere, take to the road – a renowned twenty-six miles of road from Hopkinton to Boston.
At the original Marathon, 26 miles from Athens, Greece, free, Democratic, Western civilization faced and defeated the forces of absolutism. It is a battle that has been fought many times. It will be fought many more times. Freedom must always be prepared to fight just to be free.
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