Posted on April 5, 2022
This is an update of my post published on April 5, 2011:
Today’s holiday is sometimes called Ching Ming, Clear Bright Festival, Ancestors’ Day, or Tomb-Sweeping Day.
It is a festival that has been celebrated for more than 2,500 years—although Communist China repealed the holiday from 1949 to 2008. Families honor their ancestors at grave sites, praying, sweeping the tombs, and making offerings of food, drinks, chopsticks, or other items. Some families also enact rituals or burn “spirit money” and drawings of cars, homes, phones, and servants; these paper versions of things people believe will be needed in the afterlife are delivered to the dead ancestors by being burned.
Nowadays, some families fly kites on this festival day.
How do you and your family honor ancestors? You, too, could go to a graveyard to tend the graves of departed family members, and you could look at old photos and remember anecdotes about grandparents or great-grandparents or…
Some families don’t know much about their history—so consider doing some research on genealogy to find out more.
Of course, genealogical research is easier for some folks than for others. If your ancestors were enslaved or conquered – if they were refugees fleeing from a war or victims of a natural disaster – it’s possible that you won’t be able to find records after a certain point. To know a bit about your ancestry from farther back, if you find yourself in this situation, you could consider doing a DNA test.
Also on this date:
Birthday of biologist Matthias Jakob Schleiden, co-founder of the cell theory 
Anniversary of the eruption of Tambora
Anniversary of the 1893 decision to get the U.S. on the metric system
HolidayTime in Taiwan
Anniversary of the Mayflower’s Return Trip
Anniversary of the discovery of Linear B – an archeological treasure
Birthday of former-slave and Union hero Robert Smalls
Birthday of scientist Hedwig Kohn
Birthday of Yale U. funder Elihu Yale
Birthday of Tuskegee U. founder Booker T. Washington
Plan ahead:
Check out my Pinterest boards for:
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April holidays
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April birthdays
And here are my Pinterest boards for:
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May holidays
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May birthdays
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Historical anniversaries in May
