The Library Remembers When...

From the Ipswich Tribune May 15, 1930 edition

Saturday, May 24 Set Aside for Poppy Day

Saturday May 24 has been officially designated “Poppy Day” throughout the United States by the national department of the American Legion Auxiliary. On this day millions of confined in Battle Mountain sanitarium of France and Flanders in memory of the men who gave their lives in the World War.

In Ipswich, the Auxiliary will have these memorial flowers on hand for this day. The units in the South Dakota department are supplied with poppies made by the disabled veterans. Americans will wear the little red poppy at Hot Springs, S. D. This manufacturing program has been in progress since late last fall and early winter by these disabled men and aside from furnishing the quantity necessary for state sales, the Auxiliary department has also received orders from North Dakota, Wyoming and Montana for many thousands of these flowers. Throughout the winter and spring months the hospitalized men are given profitable employment shaping the little red poppies. The work of making the poppies is a true God-send to many hundreds of disabled veterans in this state and throughout the country. The work is given only to men receiving little or no government compensation and for many it is the only possibility of earning money during the year. The poppy making has a beneficial effect in addition to the money it enables them to earn. Men busy in this manner do not give themselves up to depressing worry. The hospital hours are shorter for them and they are given a new interest in life.

Wearing the little memorial poppy has a double significance, that of honoring the dead and helping the living. The funds derived from the poppy sale constitute the largest source of revenue for the rehabilitation and child welfare work of the Legion and of the Auxiliary.

The dimes, quarters and dollars received in this sale enables the Auxiliary units not only in South Dakota but throughout the nation to carry out a constructive program of aid to the dependent families of veterans during the year. Poppy day is the one day when the public is privileged to contribute toward this great work.