I must admit, I was blown away this morning when I asked my circulation director if our NIE coordinator was going to be at work today. He went on to inform me that today was Casimir Pulaski Day and the public schools were closed so she probably wouldn’t be in. (For the record, my two boys go to Westfair Christian Academy in Jacksonville and they aren’t closed today. That is why I didn’t know.) Since I am new to Illinois (if being here a little over two years now is new), I have to admit I had never heard of Casimir Pulaski and never thought our schools would be closed to honor him.

Now, I know school systems can be a bit funky sometimes, especially when it comes to drafting what days they will and won’t have school, but this one caught me by surprise. I had to ask Ron if he was joking when he told me. One of our district sales managers was quick to confirm what Ron was telling me. His wife works for the school system and sure enough, today, March 3, is Casimir Pulaski Day.

Intrigued, I decided to find out more about Casimir Pulaski, given that a majority of school kids got a three-day weekend out of the guy. Here is what I found on Wikipedia (I wanted to make sure the following is attributed to something, so some won’t think I’m making this stuff up…)

“Casimir Pulaski Day is a holiday observed in Illinois on the first Monday of every March to commemorate Casimir Pulaski, a Revolutionary War cavalry officer born March 4, 1747 in Poland as Kazimierz Pułaski. He was a Polish soldier. He is known for his contributions to the US military at the time by training its soldiers and cavalry. The day is celebrated mainly in areas that have large Polish populations. This is a separate holiday from the federal holiday, General Pulaski Memorial Day, which commemorates Pulaski’s death at the Siege of Savannah on October 11, 1779.”

“Illinois enacted a law on June 20, 1977 to celebrate the birthday of Casimir Pulaski and held the first official Pulaski Day celebrations in 1978. The bill was introduced by Senator Leroy W. Lemke (D)- Chicago. Chicago celebrates Pulaski Day on the first Monday in March with an annual parade. Cook County government (which includes Chicago) and the Chicago Public Library also close on this holiday. The holiday is also observed in Wisconsin public schools, celebrated March 4th, as outlined in state statute 118.02 (although this is not universally observed). Indiana also marks the day as a commemorative day by governor’s proclamation (IC 1-1-12.5), although it is not a state holiday.”

In my research, it didn’t appear that all school systems throughout the state observe Pulaski Day. At least I could only find it on a handful of school calendars I could find. Did they think that Mr. Pulaski wasn’t important enough to warrant a day off of school? That’s kind of interesting if you ask me. While I’m sure that those with Polish heritage appreciate Mr. Pulaski’s contributions to both Poland and the USA and school kids and teachers around the state also thank him for the extra day away from the classroom, is this really a holiday that we should include on a school or government holiday list?

So to all those of non-Polish decent, this is who Casimir Pulaski was and why Illinois celebrates him with a “get out of school free” day. And I thought lawyers and bankers had it easy with their holiday schedules. But I did hear of another school district that will remain nameless that moved their calendar around to correspond to the opening of deer season … now there’s a holiday that most in rural Illinois can get their arms around.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 3rd, 2008 at 12:13 pm and is filed under rants. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.