TRUTH
By Nancy Bo Flood
Memorial Day 2025
This Memorial Day is especially meaningful as I reflect on the many people in my family, in our country, through many generations, who have given years of their lives to protect democracy and freedom for us. How can their contributions be minimized, even erased from history?
I am deeply disturbed and alarmed that Navajo Code Talkers were removed from the military website, as were other marginalized groups, including women. Removal is a silent form of cultural and personal genocide.
How do we learn the truth? We read critically, choosing from many sources and many books, available in public libraries, and then … We reflect, discuss, listen and decide. We make our own decisions about what is true.
Without libraries, without free access to all books, we are kept from the truth. It took researchers, artists, authors and musicians to show the truth about the Japanese internment camps … the truth about Native American massacres … the truth about stolen lands, stolen water, stolen children.
Recently, I was asked, “Why do I write for children?” While thinking about this question, I realized that one important reason why I write books for children is to share what I have researched, learned or experienced. Then they choose — what to read, what to think about and decide for themselves what is true.
Memorial Day, a remembrance and a reflection of the cost of the freedom to speak, to read with “liberty and justice for all.”