Why Family History?

 I am the coordinator of 5 USGenWeb sites.  Basically, I am a web mom. I try to get new data up as I can. Submissions are few and far between. At least a year ago I added Find-A-Grave, Gold Star Veteran, and sometimes other links to the list of WWII casualties on one of my sites. I had started on the second county list some time ago, and I finally got back to finishing it off. 

It is harder to do right now, as my feelings are raw and painful, even full of fear, knowing how things may soon be. We are standing at the precipice. Do we continue to soar, or do we take a step off the steep cliff into chaos and darkness.  We have choices, one choice does not understand freedom or making a sacrifice for the freedom of ourselves or others, the other choice is service, respect and the fight to stay free. One wants to jail or kill those who disagree, the other is freedom to disagree and still be friends or family. Democracy in fact. But the friends and family thing has disappeared, the circles have been broken. Can we fix it?

I have several ancestors that fought (for the right side) in the Revolutionary War. You know the one? People with a dream of freedom, throwing off that suffocating kingly blanket, standing free, on their own. They did this without a standing army, having faith that their descendants would live free. They fought valiantly, not even sure that they would live to see the results of their actions. But they had faith that they were fighting for a just cause. If the dream had failed, the Revolution lost, we would never have known having choices.

All of the wars we have fought were for the same reason. In hindsight some were indeed sketchier than others. But our boys went in fighting to keep us or others free from tyranny. Today it suddenly occurred to me that if we step off that precipice, they all will have died for nothing. They just postponed the darkness, that's all. If WWII had been lost, if our boys had said, nope, not gonna fight, life would be different. The enemy would have come here. Its goal was the world.  Its darkness is slowly seeping into our bright future, it takes a little freedom here and a little there, dimming the light of freedom. 

 Every family is touched by war at some time. Being a family historian, you can see the broken branches that war caused. You know the struggle so many went through to get here, to be free to make their own choices, to bring light to the darkness of their lives. You've recorded the sacrifices families made because they believed in the dream of democracy. All people need to know their family history. It's very important, now more than ever.