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Stories of veteran service and sacrifice straight from the people driving today’s most important veterans causes and veterans organizations around the world. The show shines a spotlight on their inspiring projects making a real difference for veterans and their families, and along the way we'll hear the stories that drive them to do their best every day as they work to support veterans and their memory.
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Speaker 1
Hey, it's Matthew Cudmore and welcome to Story Behind the Storm. Today we're joined by
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Speaker 1
Doctor Allison Finkelstein of U.S. Army National Military Cemeteries
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Speaker 1
to talk about Arlington National Cemetery, the evolving role of commemoration. Now, Doctor Finkelstein and her team are helping visitors connect with the past. Doctor Finkelstein, thanks for the work that you're doing to preserve and share these powerful stories.
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Speaker 1
And to our listeners, thanks for tuning in.
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Speaker 1
Welcome to story Behind the Stone A story talk, service, sacrifice, and story. Connecting to the people, changing the way the world remembers, and veterans causes and commemoration.
00:00:46:20 - 00:00:49:09
Speaker 1
I'm so pleased to welcome to the show today,
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Speaker 1
Doctor Allison Finkelstein of U.S. Army National Military Cemeteries
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Speaker 1
it's wonderful to chat with you today.
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Speaker 2
Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to be on this podcast and I enjoy listening to your episodes.
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Speaker 1
What
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Speaker 1
is driving your day to day at the Army National Military Cemeteries at Arlington National Cemetery? And what keeps your fires burning?
00:01:06:13 - 00:01:29:12
Speaker 2
Working at Arlington National Cemetery. I quickly learned that there is no average day, and every day has its share of adventures and challenges. So today, I have spent much of my workday focused on book revisions for a project that I'm working on. But, last week we were actually doing a tram tour in honor of the Navy's 250th birthday.
00:01:29:17 - 00:01:50:17
Speaker 2
One day, I could be giving a exhibit tour to a dignitary, and the next day I could be deep into archival research. So every day is different. Every day is exciting. And one of the things that drives me the most is this feeling of the overwhelming amount of stories that there are to be told at Arlington.
00:01:50:18 - 00:02:02:17
Speaker 1
Could you please just share a little bit of context for listeners? I think most listeners are vaguely aware of Arlington National Cemetery. Could you get a give a sense of the and the scale and the scope of the cemetery itself?
00:02:02:18 - 00:02:29:05
Speaker 2
Arlington was created in 1864 during the American Civil War, and it was initially a burial ground for U.S. soldiers, primarily, who died in the surrounding Virginia battlefields. War of disease in Washington, D.C. area hospitals and started off as a very humble place. These national military cemeteries that were created during the Civil War, they were not considered honorable burial grounds like they are today.
00:02:29:10 - 00:02:53:16
Speaker 2
So there was really nothing special about Arlington. It was for those whose families couldn't afford to preserve their remains and have them shipped home. So our beginnings were very modest, and it took an evolution over decades and eventually more than a century, for Arlington to become known as America's premier national military cemetery. And that happened for a couple of reasons.
00:02:53:17 - 00:03:12:08
Speaker 2
It happened because of the rise of the annual Memorial Day observance that happens here. It happened because of the installation of the tomb of the Unknown Soldier. And then, of course, the burial of President John F Kennedy. His funeral was televised. So people all over the nation and the world saw what it meant to be buried at Arlington.
00:03:12:08 - 00:03:18:01
Speaker 2
And that really raised our profile. So that from that origin story in the Civil War,
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Speaker 2
we are now a cemetery with a size of more than 639 acres, over 420,000 burials
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Speaker 2
So we are growing, we continue to grow, and we're not trapped in time. We're not trapped in history. We are still an active military cemetery, and there's just so much to talk about at Arlington that when I say I'm overwhelmed by the history there is to tell, I'm not exaggerating.
00:03:44:06 - 00:03:50:18
Speaker 1
I'm curious about kind of what Arlington means to Americans today, that so much history that is available to them there.
00:03:50:19 - 00:04:15:11
Speaker 2
I can't speak for every American because each American who visits will have their own experience and find their own meaning at the cemetery, and that's something that we are trying to encourage. We don't want to impose our own viewpoints and understandings of the cemetery on our visitors. We want to inspire them to come away with their own meanings and their own connections that relate to it.
00:04:15:11 - 00:04:40:01
Speaker 2
Starting in 2019 to 2020, we launched our first education program and our first interpretation program. And through these programs, we're actually giving visitors both in-person visitors and virtual visitors, the tools they need to find that meaning. In Arlington. So we have broad themes that we like to share and that we hope will inspire support and conversation among our visitors.
00:04:40:03 - 00:04:57:01
Speaker 2
One of those is that Arlington is a microcosm of the United States. Every story, every community, every person who lives and resides in this country can find a connection to a story here. So that's something that we're trying to bring to our visitors and get them to think about.
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Speaker 1
What do you think? When are you kind of driving to work? The weight of it must be so important and meaningful to you.
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Speaker 2
It is. It's it's really meaningful. I am an Army brat, so I was raised in a military family. Both of my grandfathers served in World War Two. One of them was wounded on D-Day. So America's military past is something that I grew up with. And and I learned to respect. But I also learned that it was important to question American history and to think about it deeply.
00:05:28:04 - 00:05:54:05
Speaker 2
So to be able to drive into the gates of Arlington every day and work there as a historian, it is is really humbling. And it puts in perspective the work that we do as historians at the cemetery. So much of my historical training was all about my own research. And what impact am I making on the historiography with with days spent alone in the archives, days spent alone writing.
00:05:54:05 - 00:06:23:12
Speaker 2
And while I still do a good bit of that, now I get to focus that historical work, that scholarship, those public history projects on a mission that honors our military dead and teaches about them to my fellow citizens and and worldwide travelers and visitors. And I find a lot of meaning in that and a lot of purpose. So it becomes more about my own work and more about the mission, which is what's so great about being a historian for the federal government.
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Speaker 1
When I think about Arlington, you know, I think about the vastness of it, all of the different sections. Is there a section that you like to take folks to personally?
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Speaker 2
It's a hard question, because there are so many sections that I find fascinating and would just love to spend hours walking around. One of the sections that I really try to get more visitors to is section 27, which is actually the first section that was created in the cemetery. I won't get into this story now, but the section numbers in Arlington are not chronological based on when the cemetery was created.
00:06:58:19 - 00:07:35:04
Speaker 2
Yes, it's very confusing. So section 27 is where the first burials were placed. So our first burial, the first Civil War service member who was brought to the Arlington property for burial in May of 1864 was William Chrisman. So that section is really the birthplace of Arlington National Cemetery, and it's really moving to be there. And think about those service members and how their burials started, the process of that property becoming the cemetery that we know it today.
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Speaker 2
But there's also another really important aspect to section 27 that our team is trying to bring more awareness to, because it's it's very often gotten overlooked. And those are the graves a little bit past, that first grave of of William Christman. Those are the graves of freed people. These were formerly enslaved men, women and children who sought their own freedom during the American Civil War by fleeing to the U.S. Army's lines.
00:08:05:18 - 00:08:33:12
Speaker 2
And these people resided in refugee camps and other barracks and temporary types of housing around the DC area. Not on the Arlington property. There was a Freedman's Village on the Arlington property. We can talk about that later if you want, but these freed people buried in section 27 lived elsewhere. And the government, the US government, took responsibility for giving them a decent and respectable burial.
00:08:33:14 - 00:09:01:22
Speaker 2
And they are buried not far from those first Civil War burials. It's one of the few places where you can actually see the visible evidence of the civil War's impact on the enslaved and reconstruction on the landscape. You walk around this part of the cemetery and you see headstones that say the word citizen and civilian, that saying the names of children, babies, mothers, grandparents.
00:09:01:22 - 00:09:19:13
Speaker 2
And through the burial records, we know what a lot of these people died of. They died of of diarrhea. They died of infectious, contagious diseases. They were many of them elderly, many of them young. So walking through there gives a good reminder of what the Civil War was about.
00:09:19:13 - 00:09:24:03
Speaker 1
Are there any other under told stories that you'd like to highlight that resonate with you during.
00:09:24:03 - 00:09:47:17
Speaker 2
World War One, there were many women who served in uniform and under oath and worked for the U.S. military, but were not actually allowed to be in the U.S. military because of policies at the time. And those women, because they were not actually in the military, were not eligible for burial at Arlington. But we actually have some of them buried here at Arlington because of their husbands service.
00:09:47:23 - 00:10:18:01
Speaker 2
So we have the graves of at least two hello girls, women who served as bilingual telephone operators for the U.S. Signal Corps during World War One. And we also have the graves of several reconstruction aides. Those were physical and occupational therapists who worked with the wounded. So those are examples I like to bring up, because those women fought usually unsuccessfully, at least in their lifetimes, for recognition as veterans, which would have given them their own eligibility for burial at Arlington.
00:10:18:03 - 00:10:25:09
Speaker 2
But we can still tell their stories because of their husbands, and we can get at that issue of their lack of veterans recognition.
00:10:25:09 - 00:10:38:03
Speaker 1
I've had the privilege of walking the grounds. I was struck by the sheer variety of memorials. Are there any other unconventional memorials or maybe forgotten or invisible memorials that you see as you're engaging with with the space?
00:10:38:05 - 00:10:57:22
Speaker 2
Well, as we mentioned at Arlington, we have a lot of what I would classify as traditional memorials. So we have the Nurses Memorial in section 21, which is one of my favorites. It's this beautiful sculpture of a female nurse. She has this cape flowing down her shoulders, and she's kind of looking off over her shoulder at the female nurses.
00:10:57:22 - 00:11:39:07
Speaker 2
Her comrades were buried beneath her. So that is one example of a traditional memorial. But we also have memorial trees throughout the cemetery. So these are trees that were dedicated with, usually a plaque underneath or next to them that describes the unit or event that they are commemorating. And these trees were intended to bring life while also commemorating or memorializing the dead, and particularly after World War One, memorial trees or living memorials, so buildings or structures that had a memorial purpose but also had a useful function.
00:11:39:07 - 00:11:55:04
Speaker 2
Those were really popular. So Arlington has a lot of those Memorial trees, and we have a fantastic horticulture team who runs our Memorial Arboretum or a level three, the Memorial Arboretum. So those trees are also, are an important part of that arboretum and its landscape.
00:11:55:04 - 00:12:05:20
Speaker 1
If I could turn the lens a little bit back to you, I'm curious about how you first got interested in this space and me work before Arlington. That's kind of informed your work today.
00:12:05:20 - 00:12:35:02
Speaker 2
So I went into graduate school as an early American historian and shifted to the 20th century, particularly World War one. But that shift was driven by an interest in commemoration and battlefield cemeteries. After college and before graduate school, I had this incredible opportunity to live and work in England for a year and teach at a boarding school there, and be an assistant in their history and drama departments and the kids there.
00:12:35:02 - 00:13:07:09
Speaker 2
Instead of going on a field trip to Gettysburg, they'll go on a field trip to the Western Front. I should also mention, because I'm guessing you have a lot of Canadian listeners. We also went to some Canadian World War One sites, so we did go to Vimy Ridge, which was a pretty powerful, experience. So being at places like Vimy Ridge or the Somme, seeing the farm and memorial with these British schoolchildren who were being taught the importance of remembering World War One, they were wearing poppies on their lapels.
00:13:07:09 - 00:13:34:03
Speaker 2
They were reading these World War One poems and going to a Remembrance Sunday service. It got me thinking, well, why isn't the United States remembering World War One like this? Why wasn't I taught about World War One? Why don't we have that impact of this long ago war still within our national consciousness? And that question gradually drove me away from the American Revolution.
00:13:34:03 - 00:13:42:14
Speaker 2
But I'm excited to get back to it next year, as we'll talk about towards the First World War, military cemeteries, memorials and commemoration.
00:13:42:14 - 00:13:52:08
Speaker 1
It's really fascinating just to think about how different countries commemorate how they remember. What do you think is driving that difference and how World War One resonates with Americans versus World War Two?
00:13:52:09 - 00:14:22:17
Speaker 2
That's such a hard question. And as a naive graduate student, I thought that could be a great dissertation topic. And of course, it's way too massive. So with my dissertation, which I later turned into a book, which I won't talk about here, I tried to get at one slice of that question, a very tiny slice. So I would say one way to answer that question would be those living memorials, or memorials that were a little bit less traditional, that did not leave a lasting impact on the landscape.
00:14:22:19 - 00:14:52:20
Speaker 2
A lot of it would be the importance of veterans groups that were so tied to living veterans, both male and female, recognized and unrecognized. So those hello girls and reconstruction needs I would classify as part of that. The memory was living in those people who were so deeply connected to World War One. There has been progress we've been making here in the United States with trying to increase interest in the war, particularly with the centennial, as we call it over here.
00:14:52:22 - 00:15:14:02
Speaker 2
We had some great work done by the World War One Centennial Commission. Now the Doughboy Foundation is taking on that effort. And at Arlington, we are really trying to get people interested in in World War one, because there's so much World War One history at Arlington in 2021, the cemetery commemorated the centennial of the tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
00:15:14:02 - 00:15:31:14
Speaker 2
And that really brought World War One to many of our visitors online and in person. So we're continuing to push with that, and I don't think we'll ever get to where the British are, or maybe even the Canadians. But I certainly think that we're trying to make progress.
00:15:31:15 - 00:15:39:06
Speaker 1
If I'm visiting Arlington and I wanted to, check out a few World War One linked individuals, are there any that kind of stick out to you?
00:15:39:07 - 00:16:03:06
Speaker 2
Well, I would send you first to the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, which was created on November 11th, 1921, the anniversary of Armistice Day, as a memorial to all unidentified and unrecovered American service members. So there's one body in there from World War One, and eventually we added unknowns from World War Two, the Korean War and the Vietnam War.
00:16:03:06 - 00:16:29:11
Speaker 2
Although the Vietnam War unknown was eventually identified positively and disinterred, which is a very fascinating story. But I would send you first to the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, particularly, for visitors from Europe and Canada, where so many of those countries have their own tombs. I would want you to be able to compare and contrast. And then I would send you two sections 18 and sections 19 of the cemetery.
00:16:29:13 - 00:17:06:00
Speaker 2
And those are sections that have many graves of service members who were repatriated from Europe. So these were men, mostly, who died on the battlefields of the Western Front and whose families elected to have them brought home for burial at Arlington. I can share one particular older story. So I started researching this soldier at the end of the summer for one of our special tours we did in honor of the Army's 250th birthday, which the United States celebrated this year in 2025.
00:17:06:02 - 00:17:11:09
Speaker 2
And we did a walking tour with the National Museum of the United States Army. And we spent a good amount of time in
00:17:11:09 - 00:17:11:17
Speaker 2
sections
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Speaker 2
18 and 19, and I dug into the stories of several service members in section 19, which is a segregated section. It's important to note that Arlington was segregated by race and rank until 1948, when president Harry Truman desegregated the military.
00:17:32:12 - 00:18:05:06
Speaker 2
So we have sections that were segregated. Section 19 was for black enlisted repatriated service members. And right next to it, section 18 was for white enlisted, mostly repatriated service members. So I just spent some time one day walking through the rows there and taking notes, and then went back to do my research. And I found one story of Sylvester Duckett, who's buried in section 19, and he died, I believe he was just 19 years old.
00:18:05:08 - 00:18:15:08
Speaker 2
He was from Washington, D.C., and against the wishes of his mother, he joined the army. He joined the New York National Guard, the unit that went on to become the
00:18:15:08 - 00:18:39:06
Speaker 2
369th Infantry, known as the Harlem Hellfighters or the Harlem Rattlers, and he was killed in action, I think it was on October 1st, 1918, as part of the Harlem Hellfighters, and I really wanted to highlight his story because just last month, US in the US Congress actually awarded the Harlem Hellfighters the Congressional Gold Medal.
00:18:39:11 - 00:19:14:16
Speaker 2
So there was a ceremony more than 100 years after the war, honoring this group of African American soldiers who fought in a segregated army and actually fought under the French Army, not under the US Army. So I was able to pull his story out and find a few sentences about him and it really showed me the personal losses experienced in World War One, especially when I think about his his mother, who lived in Washington, D.C. did she choose to have him buried at Arlington so that she could visit him more easily?
00:19:14:16 - 00:19:16:13
Speaker 2
I don't know, but I have to wonder.
00:19:16:13 - 00:19:22:17
Speaker 1
Do you ever get the opportunity to walk the grounds with veterans families? What do they share with you when they're walking the grounds? What are they feeling?
00:19:22:17 - 00:19:53:00
Speaker 2
I don't spend as much time with the families of those who are buried at the cemetery as my colleagues, who actually work, in parts of the cemetery that deal with the actual funerals. So they are really the ones who are on the ground at those funerals. We try very hard to make sure that even though Arlington is a national landmark and a major tourist site, that the families who are having a loved one buried feel like they're the only funeral happening that day.
00:19:53:00 - 00:20:15:16
Speaker 2
So we generally try to give, give distance and create space for those people to have privacy. So while I don't talk to them, usually at the funerals, I do meet them during events, and tours, particularly Memorial Day. We get a lot of veterans who like to come out, who may have friends or colleagues, relatives buried at the cemetery, and they just want to learn.
00:20:15:18 - 00:20:38:05
Speaker 2
They want to find out more about the cemetery. They want to understand its history. And I think particularly for people who come for a funeral and see how vast the landscape is and how much there is to see, they realize that there's a lot more to learn. I did have a really good interaction with the veteran last week on our Navy 250 tour.
00:20:38:09 - 00:21:06:01
Speaker 2
We had a retired admiral who I believe was 90 or 91 years old, on that tram tour with us, and at our first stop, we visited the grave of Admiral Rickover, often called the father of America's nuclear Navy. And our retired admiral friend who joined us, mentioned that he knew Admiral Rickover. So there we were, standing in his grave talking about him, and we had a gentleman who had worked with him.
00:21:06:03 - 00:21:12:09
Speaker 2
And, you know, we we were able to chat a little bit about his experiences with Admiral Rickover. So that was pretty incredible.
00:21:12:09 - 00:21:19:13
Speaker 1
Tell us a little bit about these tram tours. It sounds like an and fascinating way to explore such a vast, vast place.
00:21:19:13 - 00:21:41:11
Speaker 2
Yes. So our office, the history office, we try to do public tours and events throughout the year, generally during the nicer weather. A lot of times they're walking tours, but we often are able to use a tram, particularly with a tour like the Navy 250 tour. There's so much history to cover. It would take us 8 or 9 hours to do it on foot.
00:21:41:12 - 00:22:05:00
Speaker 2
So this year we've done two tours for the Army's birthday. One was on foot, one was on the tram. We also did a walking another full hike for the Army's birthday. We did a Navy 250 tram tour, and then I believe it's on November 10th. We're doing a marine Corps 250 tram tour, which I believe is the actual date of the the Marine Corps 250th birthday.
00:22:05:00 - 00:22:22:22
Speaker 2
That one is sold out right now. All tickets are free. But if you're listening to this and you're able to come, all you have to do is show up in the morning and get on our waitlist. We generally have a good amount of people who drop since the tickets are free, so we can probably still be able to get you on.
00:22:22:22 - 00:22:26:12
Speaker 1
What are the links that the Marines have with Arlington?
00:22:26:12 - 00:22:49:01
Speaker 2
Oh my goodness, there's there's so many links. So we have many, many famous Marines that are buried at Arlington. Most famously is is General Lejeune Although if there's Marine out there I know some of you say General “Lejeurne”, I'm an Army brat. So I'll, I'll say Lejeune. So he's one of the most famous Marines in American history.
00:22:49:03 - 00:23:11:17
Speaker 2
We have Marines from conflicts spanning most of our nation's history. The Civil War, World War one, the the World War one, Unknown soldier, or the World War two, or Korean War or Vietnam War. Unknown soldiers. Those could also be Marines. Even though the name of the tomb has soldier in it. It was intended to represent any American service member.
00:23:11:17 - 00:23:36:03
Speaker 2
So why don't we do this tram tour for the Marine Corps 250th birthday? We're going to be dragging people all over the cemetery to different sites that focus on the Marine Corps history. One of them that I'm excited about is the mast of the Maine memorial, because when the USS Maine exploded in Havana Harbor in 1898, sparking the Spanish-American War, there were Marines who were on board the ship and who perished.
00:23:36:03 - 00:23:39:16
Speaker 1
Is it actually the mast of the Maine? It's not a recreation?
00:23:39:16 - 00:23:58:00
Speaker 2
It is an actual mast of the Maine. Through a feat of engineering that I will probably never understand, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers dredged Havana Harbor and was able to to raise the main. So the mast in our memorial is the actual mast, and the other mast is at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis.
00:23:58:00 - 00:24:00:01
Speaker 1
If they miss the tour, where can they find it?
00:24:00:01 - 00:24:23:09
Speaker 2
So on our education programs website, we have different modules which have walking tour documents, including a marine Corps walking tour. It's not going to be exactly the same one that we give. We try to when we get out with people, we really try to give you a special tour told from this unique lens of the historians, but we have dozens of walking tour documents on that education site.
00:24:23:12 - 00:24:39:14
Speaker 2
So if you come to the cemetery and you're on your own, you can pull those up on your phone, you can print them out. You could do the whole tour, or you can say, I actually only want to go to these two stops, but you'll have all of the information there so you can guide yourself around and learn independently.
00:24:39:14 - 00:24:48:16
Speaker 1
For listeners who haven't been to Arlington, what's the best way to kind of tackle their visit? Can they walk into the visitor center, speak with someone about themes?
00:24:48:16 - 00:25:15:20
Speaker 2
The answer to the question depends on how much you like to walk. There is a lot of walking, and there are a lot of hills and not a lot of bathrooms. So if you like to walk and you've got the proper footwear, I always recommend to people, come into our welcome center, spend some time in our main exhibit there, and then utilize our education program to pick out some stops and sights that you would like to visit.
00:25:15:20 - 00:25:42:04
Speaker 2
If it's your first time, make sure that you get to the grave of John F Kennedy. You get to the tomb of the unknown Soldier, but then look at those maps and the walking tours and figure out which stops you want to go. Do negotiate with your travel companions. If you're not there on your own walk. If walking up a hilly cemetery is not your preferred way to spend a leisure day, there is also a tram.
00:25:42:06 - 00:26:08:15
Speaker 2
You can purchase tickets for the tram and it's hop on, hop off style so you can get off, you can get on, you can visit as many sights as you want and you can also still walk around the cemetery, but you won't have to walk as much. We don't have docents, per se, that are going to talk to you about the themes, but if you're interested in that, utilizing the education program will help you or if you want.
00:26:08:15 - 00:26:19:16
Speaker 2
We have many webinars on our website that get into some of the details of the cemetery. If you know you're on a flight and you want to listen to something to do some prep, you can put those on as well.
00:26:19:16 - 00:26:34:16
Speaker 1
You have so much available to visitors in terms of the welcome center of the webinars. Arlington is also a pioneer, in the mobile phone realm with Fancy Explorer. How do you see visitors using that to to connect with the history? And how is it being used today?
00:26:34:20 - 00:26:58:09
Speaker 2
Well, I should first say that the ANC explorer app was not developed by me or my team. So I want to give full credit to the people who created it. Its purpose is to help visitors of all kinds navigate the cemetery. Whether you are coming because you want to go to the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, or because you want to visit the grave of your grandfather, it can be hard to figure out where those graves are.
00:26:58:11 - 00:27:31:23
Speaker 2
So the app is intended to provide a map and directions that get you from where you are to the site that you need to see. What we've been able to do in the History office is enhance the interpretive tools provided to the visitors. We also have a platform called story s t q r y, but it's pronounced story and it's also available on your smartphone where you can access the education programs, walking tours, but in a format that works on your phone.
00:27:31:23 - 00:27:33:19
Speaker 2
So we're providing that as well.
00:27:33:20 - 00:27:42:14
Speaker 1
Looking forward to 2026. There is the 250th anniversary coming up. What can Americans look forward to at ANC?
00:27:42:14 - 00:28:11:14
Speaker 2
Pretty much every history organization in the United States right now is gearing up for America's two 50th, celebration of of that anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence and this effort to really commemorate the American Revolution and our country's founding. So we are no different, even though Arlington National Cemetery was created during the American Civil War in 1864, we actually have graves that go all the way back to the American Revolution.
00:28:11:14 - 00:28:22:00
Speaker 2
These were graves that were brought here later on, usually in the late 19th, early 20th century. But we are able to tell the stories of the American Revolution at
00:28:22:00 - 00:28:38:20
Speaker 2
Arlington, most famously, we have the grave of Pierre L’Enfant, that famous French officer who fought, with the American army and then later went on his work, laid the foundation for the design of Washington, DC, as we know it today.
00:28:38:22 - 00:29:00:23
Speaker 2
So our office, the history office, will be releasing, a bunch of programing. We're hoping to do some walking tours focused on those Revolutionary War graves and sites of Arlington. We're hoping to be able to do some virtual programs as well. We recognize that a lot of our audience and our visitors can't actually come here in person.
00:29:01:01 - 00:29:20:03
Speaker 2
But as much as people may want to join us for our Marine Corps tour, you simply don't live in the DC area. So we really try hard to do virtual programs like webinars so that we can be accessible to our visitors wherever they are. So stay tuned about those. You are not excluded if you don't live in the DC area.
00:29:20:05 - 00:29:59:11
Speaker 2
So we'll have all of that information on our website and our social media. But it's going to be a lot of American Revolution. I am very, very excited, to dig into that history because there's also a lot of really interesting comparisons and commemorative links between the American Revolution and other time periods in American history, for example, with World War One, when the U.S. Army got to Paris, during World War One, they said, Lafayette, we have arrived there referencing, you know, Lafayette, which everybody should know about Lafayette now because of the musical Hamilton.
00:29:59:12 - 00:30:25:03
Speaker 2
But that that statement was meant to say, we are here in France to fight for our nation's oldest allies. There's a lot of different connections that can be made and aside from America. 250 we of course have Memorial Day, which is our most important annual observance. Usually our office does a walking tour focused on the history of Memorial Day.
00:30:25:05 - 00:30:46:00
Speaker 2
And for the past several years, the cemetery has done a special event called Flowers of Remembrance Day, where the public is allowed just for that one day each year to actually go on to the plaza at the tomb of the Unknown Soldier and place a flower which is really moving, a really special experience. So it's a really great day to come out.
00:30:46:00 - 00:31:09:02
Speaker 2
Cemetery, pay your respects to the unknowns. Lay your flower. Join us on our walking tour and connected to that, big project I'm working on is the completion of a book manuscript about the origins and creation of the tomb of the Unknown Soldier. So I'm hoping that sometime in the coming months or coming year, we will have a concrete release date for that book.
00:31:09:02 - 00:31:10:10
Speaker 2
And I'll be sure to let you know.
00:31:10:12 - 00:31:15:17
Speaker 1
Allison, just before we wrap up, how can listeners, follow your work and support your work at the RNC?
00:31:15:18 - 00:31:41:22
Speaker 2
Follow us on social media. Our handle is Arlington and ATL. You can find us on Facebook Instagram. X also known as Twitter, as well as LinkedIn. You can always go to our website to check out our events that are happening and our news, particularly if you don't live locally. Social media and the website are a great way to find out about our virtual events.
00:31:41:22 - 00:32:01:13
Speaker 2
And if you see that there's a virtual event happening but you can't attend at that time, that's completely fine. Most of them are actually recorded, and it's a great thing to kind of watch if if you're doing the dishes or doing the laundry and you need some distraction. So we put those out there as resources for all of you.
00:32:01:15 - 00:32:14:20
Speaker 2
We also have a new newsletter. It's a gov delivering newsletter, so I'll make sure that you get the link for that. But if you sign up for that newsletter, you'll get an email with all of the information about what's going on at the cemetery.
00:32:14:20 - 00:32:27:01
Speaker 1
Allison, I want to thank you so much for coming on the show today. It was a real pleasure to chat with you about what you're working on, what makes Arlington special to you, and, and just to, to share more about what's coming in 2026. Yes.
00:32:27:01 - 00:32:33:23
Speaker 2
Thank you. And thanks for all the great work you guys are doing at at Memory Anchor, especially on the technology side. It's really exciting.
00:32:39:19 - 00:32:59:05
Speaker 1
Thanks so much for tuning in. Story. Behind the Stone is available on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, and on the Rise Across America Radio Network on iHeartRadio. Audacity and tune in to search for wreath. We air every Thursday at 10 a.m. eastern on the Red Cross Radio Network. Thank you for tuning in.