Growing up just over the state line from southwestern Virginia, I, too, recall Decoration Day as a big deal. It had nothing to do with the Confederacy for us, but for honoring all kinds of people long gone. As a child, I dreaded it, but looking back I can see the power and purpose of the ritual. We lose something when we lose that connection to death and the life that came before it.

Thanks so much for writing.

This is absolutely fascinating to me. We look back at people who lost children then and say, “oh, everybody lost children,” like it’s no big deal. But we know in our hearts that if we lost a child of our own (and some friends of mine just did), it’s utterly devastating — a level of loss and grief that horrifies us. It’s something we would never really expect to get over. And yet when we encounter it in the past, we blow off the suffering of our ancestors.

Staunton, VA has the historic Western State Lunatic Asylum. Founded in the 1820s, it was a very early mental institution, and conditions were actually spa-like: landscaped grounds with a stream and willows, unlocked doors, and a “rest cure” that encouraged rest and reflection. In fact, the iron fence around the grounds was not to keep inmates in, but locals out, because they wanted to picnic on the lovely grounds. A historian came to town once for a lecture, and he had found, from perhaps 1850 or so, a list of the common reasons to be admitted to an asylum. The reasons are entertaining today: religion (not enough), religion (too much), excessive masturbation, disappointment in business, and disappointment in love.

But look what’s missing: grief over losing a child, something traumatic that people in 1850 surely experienced. Why did this experience not seem to “rate” as something that required treatment or therapy??? My intuition is that grieving was a more public act then. It had more public support, and you knew that others had been through the same experience, so their counsel helped you more. And your support system was stronger.

Still, I wonder: what evidence survives of grief? Were the scars then as deep as we know they would be today?

By the way, I’m not yet forty, but I remember “Decoration Day” quite well. I grew up in rural southwest Virginia. Something else to consider is how much more _Southern_ the culture of death is, how Southerners have our gothic attachment to mossy death and how gravekeeping has lasted longer here than elsewhere.

I appreciate your reply. We’ll have to agree to disagree. I still am a big fan of BackStory, and look forward to every program.

Regards,

– EJA

To respond to your criticisms in order…

I think you are basically correct to accuse us of practicing poor journalism in our interview with Karen Meredith. We made no effort to include an opposing voice, nor did we independently confirm the facts of Ms. Meredith’s account. That said, however, I think you may perhaps be holding us to a different standard than that to which we hold ourselves. Without getting into the thorny question of who is and isn’t a “journalist,” I would basically endorse the view that journalists are “those who practice journalism.” We have never claimed to “practice journalism,” and don’t have any plans to begin doing so anytime soon. We do from time to time include voices and stories from the contemporary world as a kind of jumping-off point for larger conversations about history, but I don’t think we have ever framed any of these conversations as anything other than what they are: individual voices sharing their own stories or perspectives about the topic-at-hand. Perhaps we did an inadequate job of framing in this case — I would certainly be very interested in hearing from other listeners about their impressions of the way this interview was set up.

As for your frustration with the shortage of historical context following this segment, I would be the first to agree that this is where BackStory does have the potential to excel, and IS truly the standard to which we hold ourselves with every show. Unfortunately, all I can offer in this case is the meager, but honest, defense that there is a limit to how much you can fit into a 50-minute show. I would absolutely love to have another hour to explore the history of government censorship in wartime, and with luck, will, in the not too distant future. In the meantime, it seems to me that this website provides a second-best option for discussing everything that does not make the on-air cut.

I hope that this strikes you as an adequate answer to your criticisms, and sincerely look forward to hearing your thoughts on future episodes of the show. Thanks again for listening.

It was poor journalism because you failed to do the following:

1) Present more than one side. You interviewed an anti-war activist about the activities of the US government. While the death of Ms. Meredith’s son is a tragedy, it does not mean she is not a biased source. Did you try to get a comment from the Pentagon? You said that many families support the ban on media coverage at Dover. Did you try to talk to any of them? My understanding from the many news articles I read on this subject that Lt. Ballard’s father takes a position that is the opposite that of his ex-wife’s. If so, he would have added balance to your interview. Please review NPR’s coverage of the issue, which interviewed Ms. Meredith and, for the opposing view, another mother of a soldier who was killed.

2) Confirm any of Ms. Meredith’s claims. She claims she asked to see photographs of her son’s coffin at Dover. She claims that the Pentagon refused her request. What did you do to confirm these accusations? Did she submit e-mails or letters backing up these claims?

Your opening lacked historical context because:

1) There was no history, other than mentioning images of flag-draped coffins during the Vietnam era and that the ban was put into place in 1991. A historical approach, for example, would have attempted to explain the reasons behind the ban.

2) There was no attempt to relate the ban to other similar bans in US history. Where I thought you were going was a historical exploration of government censorship of press coverage of war dead, something that has occurred since the Civil War. Yet there was no mention at all of the history of this practice. During World War I, the federal government censored all attempts to publish photographs of the aftermath of war, not only the dead, but also wounded soldiers. And this practice continued for months after the war was over.

The rest of the program was top notch, even exceptional. Just because journalism is the so-called “first draft of history” should not give you, as professional historians, the confidence to attempt it.

I apologize if my criticism seems harsh. Please know that I consider your program by far the best at making history meaningful to the average person. That is, in my opinion, no small feat.

Respectfully,

EJ Albright

Staunton, VA has the historic Western State Lunatic Asylum. Founded in the 1820s, it was a very early mental institution, and conditions were actually spa-like: landscaped grounds with a stream and willows, unlocked doors, and a “rest cure” that encouraged rest and reflection. In fact, the iron fence around the grounds was not to keep inmates in, but locals out, because they wanted to picnic on the lovely grounds. A historian came to town once for a lecture, and he had found, from perhaps 1850 or so, a list of the common reasons to be admitted to an asylum. The reasons are entertaining today: religion (not enough), religion (too much), excessive masturbation, disappointment in business, and disappointment in love.

But look what’s missing: grief over losing a child, something traumatic that people in 1850 surely experienced. Why did this experience not seem to “rate” as something that required treatment or therapy??? My intuition is that grieving was a more public act then. It had more public support, and you knew that others had been through the same experience, so their counsel helped you more. And your support system was stronger.

Still, I wonder: what evidence survives of grief? Were the scars then as deep as we know they would be today?

By the way, I’m not yet forty, but I remember “Decoration Day” quite well. I grew up in rural southwest Virginia. Something else to consider is how much more _Southern_ the culture of death is, how Southerners have our gothic attachment to mossy death and how gravekeeping has lasted longer here than elsewhere.