At Home with Merle Burleigh

June 7, 2023 By City of West Chicago

MERLE’S CORNER

National Flag Day is Wednesday, June 14, 2023. Remember to proudly display the flag at your home and/or business. In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson issued a proclamation of establishing a national flag day to honor the United States of America flag and to commemorate the flag's adoption by the Continental Congress on June 14, 1777. On that date, the congress replaced the British symbols of the Grand Union flag with 13 white stars in a circle of blue and 13 red and white stripes, which represent the original 13 colonies. Each of the stars in the flag of today represents the 50 states in the United States. Flag Day did not become official until President Harry Truman signed the legislation in 1949.

AROUND AND ABOUT

Per Goodread, "Although more than 400 Navajos served in the military during World War II as top-secret code talkers, even those fighting shoulder to shoulder with them were not told of their covert function. And, after the war, the Navajos were forbidden to speak of their service until 1968, when the code was finally declassified. Of the original twenty-nine Navajo code talkers, only two are still alive. Chester Nez is one of them" The then eighty-nine-year-old Nez chronicled both his war years and his life growing up on the Checkerboard Area of the Navajo Reservation. His name wasn't Chester Nez. It was the English name he was assigned in kindergarten. He told Judith Schiess Avilas it was the hard life that gave him the strength, both physical and mental, to become a Marine. His story puts a living face on the legendary men who developed what is still the only unbroken code in modern warfare. As one of the "First Twenty-Nine" Code Talkers who devised the Navajo Code, Nez was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 2001. He died at the age of 93 June 4, 2014. (https://merleburl.com)

Schwinn presents the current issues before the Supreme Court and their implications. Schwinn is a professor at John Marshall Law school and is a frequent commentator on issues related to constitutional law and human rights. He is a co-founder and co-editor of the Constitutional Law Prof Blog and an occasional contributor to other blogs and publications.

League of Women Voters of Wheaton includes West Chicago, Warrenville, Winfield, Wheaton and Carol Stream. The League of Women Voters is a non-partisan organization that does not support or oppose any political party or candidate, but whose purpose is to promote political responsibility through informed and active participation of citizens in government.

Bryant Durant was born on December 14, 1808 in Ware, Hampshire County, Massachusetts. In 1837 he settled in St. Charles. Bryant married Jerusha Shurtleff on November 14, 1843 in Genoa, DeKalb County. They had thirteen children Bryant was a bricklayer and farmer. Het died on May 29, 1898 in St. Charles. (https://merleburl.com)

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COVID-19

The DuPage County Health Department developed a dashboard to provide information on the total number of people, in DuPage County, who have tested positive for COVID-19. In addition, the dashboard includes a map which shows the distribution of reported cases by municipality and is updated at 4:00 p.m. daily. DuPage County's "COVID-19 Dashboard" is a one-stop-shop for all the information it offers including a town-by-town breakdown of cases. As of Monday, June 5, 2023, there were11,941 cases and 67 deaths; this is the number from the beginning of track recording.

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ODDS AND ENDS

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