WHY POPPIES?
Veterans Day Tradition Explained
By Jim Evans

Wearing poppies to commemorate Veterans Day is a forgotten tradition by many Americans, but members of the Ramona Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 3783 are asking residents to remember that its for a good cause.

The veterans will be selling small, artificial poppies throughout the community from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Nov. 10-12, according to unofficial "Poppy Chairman" Johnny Dobson.

Proceeds will be used to help disabled veterans, and the money helps compensate the veterans who assemble the poppies. It also helps pay for state and national veterans' rehabilitation and service programs, and it partially supports the VFW National Home for orphans and widows of U.S. veterans.

Why Poppies?

It has to do with the thousands of red poppies that bloomed across some of the worst battlefields of World War I in the European theater of Flanders, which is in Belgium, France and the Netherlands.

It was discovered during the earlier Napoleonic wars that poppies seemed to thrive in the aftermath of bombardments. After soils in France and Belgium became rich in lime from rubble during the World War I, red poppies flourished around the graves of the war dead as they had 100 years earlier.

The red color of the poppies became symbolic of the blood shed by the more than 500,000 troops who died in the horrific trench warfare of the European campaign. White poppies, on the other hand, became preferred by some as a symbol of their desire for peaceful alternatives to military action. Regardless of color, the poppies honor our living veterans just as they honor those who died for our country on Memorial Day.

A battle at Flanders became the subject of a famous poem - "In Flanders Fields" - by Col. John McCrae, a Canadian soldier and physician, in 1915:

In Flanders fields the

poppies blow

Between the crosses,

row on row,

That mark our place;

and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid

the guns below

We are the dead.

Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn,

saw sunset glow,

Loved, and were loved,

and now we lie

In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel

with the foe

To you from failing

hands we throw

The torch be yours

to hold it high.

If ye break faith

with us who die

We shall not sleep,

though poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

Inspired by McCrae's poem, American Moina Michael contributed her own version in 1918, titled "We Shall Keep the Faith":

Oh! you who sleep

in Flanders fields,

Sleep sweet - to rise anew!

We caught the torch you threw

And holding high,

we keep the faith

With all who died.

We cherish, too, the poppy red

That grows on fields

where valor led;

It seems to signal to the skies

That blood of

heroes never dies,

But lends a lustre to the red

Of the flower that blooms

above the dead

In Flanders fields.

And now the torch

and poppy red

We wear in honor of our dead.

Fear not that ye have

died for naught;

We'll teach the lesson

that ye wrought

In Flanders fields.

Michael went on to originate the concept of wearing red poppies on Memorial Day in honor of those who died serving the nation during war. She became the first to wear a poppy and sold them to her friends with money donated to servicemen in need. In 1948, she was honored by the U.S. Postal Service for her role in founding the National Poppy movement by a stamp with her likeness.

The VFW subsequently became the first veterans' organization to sell poppies nationally in 1922, and it has been doing so ever since.

Veterans Day is recognized as a federal holiday each Nov. 11. Originally known as Armistice Day, celebrating the end of World War I, the name was changed in 1954 after World War II to honor those who died in American wars. Because of the redundancy with Memorial Day, it gradually evolved into a special day honoring living veterans who have served during war or peace.

Ramona's veterans will be present at Albertsons, Bank of America, Daniel's, K-Mart, Ransom Brothers, Stater Bros, Village Store and Washington Mutual to distribute poppies.

Donations of any amount are voluntary and appreciated, "but if some people can't afford a donation, they will receive a poppy anyway," Dobson said.

If your company would like to serve as a host site for VFW volunteers to distribute poppies, contact Dobson at

760-789-1452.