Memorial Day

Before it became the holiday that commemorated Americans who have defended their country in war, Memorial Day celebrated the end of the Civil War. It was felt by many of the former Confederate States that Memorial day was a Northern holiday that commemorated the North’s victory in the Civil War and for many years Memorial Day was not celebrated in the South. Throughout the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century there were markedly different feelings about the Civil War, its causes and its aftermath. The philatelic fallout from this was the establishment of two national philatelic organizations-the American Philatelic Society and the Southern Philatelic Society. Both organizations were established in the 1880’s and collectors who wanted to join philatelic organizations were never so plentiful that either stuck solely to its geographic roots. Members from all over were welcomed in both societies but the fact that there were parallel organizations was a hold over from the Civil War. The Southern Philatelic Society changed its name with time to the Society of Philatelic Americans (and was commemorated on a United States souvenir sheet (Scott #797)) and went out of business in the 1970’s after a reported shortfall in the accounting of its sales division. Like in our nation as a whole, it took nearly a hundred years after the Civil War for collectors from the north and south to forget the deep riffs caused by succession and the ending of slavery.