1.
New York City
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The City of New York, often called New York City or simply New York, is the most populous city in the United States. With an estimated 2015 population of 8,550,405 distributed over an area of about 302.6 square miles. Located at the tip of the state of New York. Home to the headquarters of the United Nations, New York is an important center for international diplomacy and has described as the cultural and financial capital of the world. Situated on one of the worlds largest natural harbors, New York City consists of five boroughs, the five boroughs – Brooklyn, Queens, Manhattan, The Bronx, and Staten Island – were consolidated into a single city in 1898. In 2013, the MSA produced a gross metropolitan product of nearly US$1.39 trillion, in 2012, the CSA generated a GMP of over US$1.55 trillion. NYCs MSA and CSA GDP are higher than all but 11 and 12 countries, New York City traces its origin to its 1624 founding in Lower Manhattan as a trading post by colonists of the Dutch Republic and was named New Amsterdam in 1626. The city and its surroundings came under English control in 1664 and were renamed New York after King Charles II of England granted the lands to his brother, New York served as the capital of the United States from 1785 until 1790. It has been the countrys largest city since 1790, the Statue of Liberty greeted millions of immigrants as they came to the Americas by ship in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and is a symbol of the United States and its democracy. In the 21st century, New York has emerged as a node of creativity and entrepreneurship, social tolerance. Several sources have ranked New York the most photographed city in the world, the names of many of the citys bridges, tapered skyscrapers, and parks are known around the world. Manhattans real estate market is among the most expensive in the world, Manhattans Chinatown incorporates the highest concentration of Chinese people in the Western Hemisphere, with multiple signature Chinatowns developing across the city. Providing continuous 24/7 service, the New York City Subway is one of the most extensive metro systems worldwide, with 472 stations in operation. Over 120 colleges and universities are located in New York City, including Columbia University, New York University, and Rockefeller University, during the Wisconsinan glaciation, the New York City region was situated at the edge of a large ice sheet over 1,000 feet in depth. The ice sheet scraped away large amounts of soil, leaving the bedrock that serves as the foundation for much of New York City today. Later on, movement of the ice sheet would contribute to the separation of what are now Long Island and Staten Island. The first documented visit by a European was in 1524 by Giovanni da Verrazzano, a Florentine explorer in the service of the French crown and he claimed the area for France and named it Nouvelle Angoulême. Heavy ice kept him from further exploration, and he returned to Spain in August and he proceeded to sail up what the Dutch would name the North River, named first by Hudson as the Mauritius after Maurice, Prince of Orange
2.
Union Square, Manhattan
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The park is under the aegis of the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation. Adjacent neighborhoods are the Flatiron District to the north, Chelsea to the west, Greenwich Village to the southwest, East Village to the southeast, many buildings of The New School are near the square, as are several dormitories of New York University. It features a wall sculpture and digital clock expelling bursts of steam. Among the heterogeneous assortment of buildings along the west side is the Decker Building, Union Square is noted for its impressive equestrian statue of U. S. A statue of Mahatma Gandhi in the southwest corner of the park was added in 1986, the 14th Street – Union Square New York City Subway station, served by the 456 <6> L N Q R W trains, is located under Union Square. In 1815, by act of the legislature, this former potters field became a public commons for the city. Ruggles obtained a lease on most of the surrounding lots from 15th to 19th Streets. In 1834 he convinced the Board of Aldermen to enclose and grade the square, then sold most of his leases, a fountain was built in the center of Union Square to receive water from the Croton Aqueduct, completed in 1842. The Everett House on the corner of 17th Street and Fourth Avenue was for one of the citys most fashionable hotels. In the early years of the park a fence surrounded the central oval planted with radiating walks lined with trees. In 1872, Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux were called in to replant the park, the last of the neighborhoods free-standing private mansions, Peter Goelets at the northeast corner of 19th Street, made way for a commercial building in 1897. The Rialto, New York Citys first commercial district, was located in. It was called the Rialto after the district in Venice. The theater district gradually re-located northward, into less expensive and undeveloped uptown neighborhoods, thus, suppliers of props, costumes, wigs, scenery, and other theatrical necessities grew up around the new theatres. The park has historically been the start or the end point for political demonstrations. In the summer of 1864 the north side of the square was the site of a Sanitary Fair, Union Square has been a frequent gathering point for radicals of all stripes to make speeches or demonstrate. On September 5,1882, in the first Labor Day celebration, on March 28,1908, an anarchist set off a bomb in Union Square which only killed himself and another man. On August 21,1893, Emma Goldman took the stage at Union Square to make her Free Bread speech to a crowd of overworked garment workers
3.
Parade
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A parade is a procession of people, usually organized along a street, often in costume, and often accompanied by marching bands, floats or sometimes large balloons. Parades are held for a range of reasons, but are usually celebrations of some kind. In Britain the term parade is usually reserved for military parades or other occasions where participants march in formation. In the Canadian Forces the term also has less formal connotations. Protest demonstrations can also take the form of a parade, the parade float got its name because the first floats were decorated barges that were towed along canals with ropes held by parade marchers on the shore. Floats were occasionally propelled from within by concealed oarsmen, but the practice was abandoned because of the incidence of drowning when the lightweight. Strikingly, among the first uses of grounded floats — towed by horses — was a ceremony in memory of recently drowned parade oarsmen, today, parade floats are traditionally pulled by motor vehicles or are powered themselves. A grand marshal is a title given to an individual by the organizing committee of a periodic parade event. Similar to guests of honor at fan conventions, a marshal is selected on any basis relevant to the theme or nature of the parade. Multiple grand marshals may often be designated for an iteration of the parade, some parades, such as pride parades, may select a Community Grand Marshal or other designations alongside a Grand Marshal to lead the front or other parts of the parade. Since the advent of technology, it became possible for aircraft. A flypast is a parade of anything from one to dozens of aircraft. They are particularly common in the United Kingdom, where they are associated with Royal occasions. Similarly, for ships, there may be a sail-past of, the longest parade in the world is the Hanover Schützenfest that takes place in Hanover every year during the Schützenfest. The parade is 12 kilometres long with more than 12,000 participants from all over the world, among more than 100 bands and around 70 floats
4.
Barbecue
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Barbecue or barbeque is both a cooking method and an apparatus. The word barbecue when used as a noun can refer to, the method itself, the meat cooked this way. The term is used as a verb, i. e. barbecuing is usually done outdoors by smoking the meat over wood or charcoal. Restaurant barbecue may be cooked in large, specially-designed brick or metal ovens, barbeque is practiced in many areas of the world and there are numerous regional variations. The English word barbecue and its cognates in other languages come from the Spanish word barbacoa, the Oxford English Dictionary traces the word to Haiti and translates it as a framework of sticks set upon posts. Gonzalo Fernández De Oviedo y Valdés, a Spanish explorer, was the first to use the word barbecoa in print in Spain in 1526 in the Diccionario de la Lengua Española of the Real Academia Española. After Columbus landed in the Americas in 1492, the Spaniards apparently found native Haitians roasting meat over a grill consisting of a wooden framework resting on sticks above a fire, the flames and smoke rose and enveloped the meat, giving it a certain flavor. The same framework was used as protection from nocturnal animal attacks. Traditional barbacoa involves digging a hole in the ground and placing some meat—usually a whole lamb—above a pot so the juices can be used to make a broth and it is then covered with maguey leaves and coal, and set alight. The cooking process takes a few hours, linguists have suggested the word barbacoa migrated from the Caribbean and into other languages and cultures, it moved from Caribbean dialects into Spanish, then Portuguese, French, and English. According to the OED, the first recorded use of the word in English was a verb in 1661, in Edmund Hickeringills Jamaica Viewed, Some are slain, And their flesh forthwith Barbacud and eat. The word barbecue was published in English in 1672 as a verb from the writings of John Lederer, the first known use of the word as a noun was in 1697 by the British buccaneer William Dampier. In his New Voyage Round the World, Dampier wrote, and lay there all night, upon our Borbecus, or frames of Sticks, raised about 3 foot from the Ground. The spelling barbeque is given in Merriam-Webster and the Oxford Dictionaries as a variant, in the southeastern United States, the word barbecue is used predominantly as a noun referring to roast pork, while in the southwestern states cuts of beef are often cooked. Because the word came from native groups, Europeans gave it savage connotations. However, according to Andrew Warnes, there is little proof that Hickeringills tale of cannibalism in the Caribbean is even remotely true. Today, those in the U. S. associate barbecue with classic Americana, in American English usage, grilling refers to a fast process over high heat while barbecuing refers to a slow process using indirect heat or hot smoke, similar to some forms of roasting. In a typical U. S. home grill, food is cooked on a grate directly over hot charcoal and its South American versions are the southern Brazilian churrasco and the Argentine asado
5.
United States
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Forty-eight of the fifty states and the federal district are contiguous and located in North America between Canada and Mexico. The state of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east, the state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean, the geography, climate and wildlife of the country are extremely diverse. At 3.8 million square miles and with over 324 million people, the United States is the worlds third- or fourth-largest country by area, third-largest by land area. It is one of the worlds most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, paleo-Indians migrated from Asia to the North American mainland at least 15,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century, the United States emerged from 13 British colonies along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the following the Seven Years War led to the American Revolution. On July 4,1776, during the course of the American Revolutionary War, the war ended in 1783 with recognition of the independence of the United States by Great Britain, representing the first successful war of independence against a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, after the Articles of Confederation, the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, were ratified in 1791 and designed to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties. During the second half of the 19th century, the American Civil War led to the end of slavery in the country. By the end of century, the United States extended into the Pacific Ocean. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the status as a global military power. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the sole superpower. The U. S. is a member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States. The United States is a developed country, with the worlds largest economy by nominal GDP. It ranks highly in several measures of performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP. While the U. S. economy is considered post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge economy, the United States is a prominent political and cultural force internationally, and a leader in scientific research and technological innovations. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America after the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci
6.
Public holidays in the United States
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Public holidays in the United States are largely controlled by private sector employers, who employ approximately 62% of the total U. S. population who are given paid time off. A typical work week is generally 40 hours a week with a Saturday-Sunday weekend, public holidays with paid time off is generally defined to occur on a day that is within the employees work week. When a holiday occurs on Saturday or Sunday, that holiday is shifted to either Friday or Monday, most employers follow a holiday schedule similar to the federal holidays of the United States, with exceptions or additions. The federal holiday schedule mainly benefits employees of government and government regulated businesses, however, this sector only comprises 15% of the working population. Besides paid holidays are festival and food holidays that also have wide acceptance based on sales of goods, halloween and Valentines Day are such examples of widely celebrated uncompensated holidays. Public holidays had their origins from established federal holidays that were enacted by Congress. S, demographics and have changed over time. Observances of holidays are most commonly observed with paid time off, however, some are observed with community work depending on the meaning of the holiday. They are however not mandated by any government, agencies, whether it be federal, state, there are no national holidays on which all businesses are closed by law. Federal holidays are only established for certain federally chartered and regulated businesses, all other public holidays are created by the States, most states also allow local jurisdictions to establish their own local holidays. As a result, holidays have not historically been governed at the federal level, some states restrict some business activities on some holidays. Business closures are mandated on some holidays in some states for certain kinds of businesses by Blue Laws, for example, some businesses cannot open on Thanksgiving Day in some New England states if the businesses operated on more than 5000 square feet of space. The most notable businesses to close on such occasions are car dealerships, as of 2012, there were eleven federal holidays in the United States, ten annual holidays and one quadrennial holiday. Pursuant to the Uniform Monday Holiday Act of 1968, official holidays are observed on a Monday, except for New Years Day, Independence Day, Veterans Day, Thanksgiving, many states also have additional holidays that are not observed by the U. S. federal government. Many businesses likewise observe certain holidays as well, which are not mandated by any government agency. Day to embrace the mostly disenfranchised African American community in the form of festivals, illinois and Berkeley, California are two places where Malcolm X is honored with a legal holiday with offices closed whereas Missouri honored Rosa Parks on her birthday. Today, the United States is the 85th most ethnically diverse country in the world, while the popularity of each public holiday cannot easily be measured, the holiday with the highest greeting card sales is Christmas. Major retail establishments such as malls, shopping centers and most retail stores only on Thanksgiving and Christmas and some on Easter Sunday as well. Virtually all companies observe and close on the major holidays, some non-retail business close on the day after Thanksgiving, while some are not allowed to close on the day after Thanksgiving
7.
Labor history of the United States
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The labor history of the United States describes the history of organized labor, as well as more general history of working people, in the United States. Unions have been important components of the Democratic Party, but that began in the 1930s, however, historians have long debated why no Labor Party emerged in the United States, in contrast to Western Europe. As commentator E. J. Dionne has noted, the movement has traditionally espoused a set of values—solidarity being the most important. Dionne notes that these values are increasingly foreign to American culture, in most industrial nations the labor movement sponsored its own political parties, with the U. S. as a conspicuous exception. Both major American parties vied for votes, with the Democrats usually much more successful. Labor unions became an element of the New Deal Coalition that dominated national politics from the 1930s into the mid-1960s during the Fifth Party System. Liberal Republicans who supported unions in the Northeast lost power after 1964, the history of organized labor has been a specialty of scholars since the 1890s, and has produced a large amount of scholarly literature focused on the structure of organized unions. In the 1960s, as social history gained popularity, a new emphasis emerged on the history of workers, including unorganized workers and this is called the new labor history. Much scholarship has attempted to bring the social history perspectives into the study of organized labor, the history of labor disputes in America substantially precedes the Revolutionary period. In 1636, for instance, there was a strike on an island off the coast of Maine. However, most instances of labor unrest during the period were temporary and isolated. Little legal recourse was available to those injured by the unrest, the only known case of criminal prosecution of workers in the colonial era occurred as a result of a carpenters strike in Savannah, Georgia, in 1746. By the beginning of the 19th century, after the revolution, the career path for most artisans still involved apprenticeship under a master, followed by moving into independent production. However, over the course of the Industrial Revolution, this rapidly changed. For instance, in Boston in 1790, the vast majority of the 1,300 artisans in the city described themselves as master workman, by 1815, journeymen workers without independent means of production had displaced these masters as the majority. By that time journeymen also outnumbered masters in New York City and this shift occurred as a result of large-scale transatlantic and rural-urban migration. Migration into the cities created a larger population of potential laborers. These conditions led to the first labor combination cases in America, the cases overwhelmingly resulted in convictions
8.
United States labor law
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United States labor law sets the rights and duties for employees, labor unions, and employers in the United States. Labor laws basic aim is to remedy the inequality of bargaining power between employees and employers, especially employers organized in the corporate or other forms of ownership association. Over the 20th century, federal law created a series of social and economic rights. The Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 requires employees have a system of work. A contract of employment can always improve standards beyond the statutory rights. To get fair terms beyond the minimum, and improve upon individual contracts. The National Labor Relations Act of 1935 creates rights for most employees to organize a labor union, under the Labor Management Reporting and Disclosure Act of 1959, labor union governance follows democratic principles. In any workplace where a majority of support a union. Unions can take action to defend their interests, including withdrawing their labor on strike. There are not yet general rights to participate in enterprise governance. Since the Civil Rights Act of 1964, all employing entities and labor unions have a duty to treat equally, without discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex. There are separate rules for sex discrimination in pay under the Equal Pay Act of 1963, additional groups with protected status were added by the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. There is no law banning all sexual orientation or identity discrimination. These equality laws generally prevent discrimination in hiring, terms of employment, there is not a federal law against unjust discharge, and most states also have no law with full protection against wrongful termination of employment. Job security rights in the US are not weaker than in all industrialized countries. On the other hand, collective agreements made by labor unions, the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act of 1988 requires employing entities give 60 days notice if more than 50 or one third of the workforce may lose their jobs. Federal law has sought to reach full employment through monetary policy, the National Labor Relations Act gave a general right to organize in a trade union and collectively bargain. In re Debs,64 Fed 724,158 U. S.564 imposed an injunction on the workers of the Pullman Company
9.
Trade union
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The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with employers. The most common purpose of these associations or unions is maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment and this may include the negotiation of wages, work rules, complaint procedures, rules governing hiring, firing and promotion of workers, benefits, workplace safety and policies. Unions may organize a section of skilled workers, a cross-section of workers from various trades. The agreements negotiated by a union are binding on the rank and file members, originating in Great Britain, trade unions became popular in many countries during the Industrial Revolution. Trade unions may be composed of workers, professionals, past workers, students. Trade union density, or the percentage of workers belonging to a union, is highest in the Nordic countries. The trade unions aim at nothing less than to prevent the reduction of wages below the level that is maintained in the various branches of industry. That is to say, they wish to prevent the price of labour-power from falling below its value, yet historian R. A. the other the aggressive-expansionist drive to unite all labouring men and women for a different order of things. The 18th century economist Adam Smith noted the imbalance in the rights of workers in regards to owners. In The Wealth of Nations, Book I, chapter 8, Smith wrote, We rarely hear, it has said, of the combination of masters. But whoever imagines, upon this account, that masters rarely combine, is as ignorant of the world as of the subject. Masters are always and everywhere in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform combination, not to raise the wages of labor above their actual rate When workers combine, masters. As Smith noted, unions were illegal for many years in most countries, there were severe penalties for attempting to organize unions, up to and including execution. This pool of unskilled and semi-skilled labour spontaneously organized in fits and starts throughout its beginnings, Trade unions and collective bargaining were outlawed from no later than the middle of the 14th century when the Ordinance of Labourers was enacted in the Kingdom of England. In 1799, the Combination Act was passed, which banned trade unions, although the unions were subject to often severe repression until 1824, they were already widespread in cities such as London. Sympathy for the plight of the workers brought repeal of the acts in 1824, by the 1810s, the first labour organizations to bring together workers of divergent occupations were formed. Possibly the first such union was the General Union of Trades, also known as the Philanthropic Society, the latter name was to hide the organizations real purpose in a time when trade unions were still illegal. The Association quickly enrolled approximately 150 unions, consisting mostly of textile related unions, but also including mechanics, blacksmiths, and various others
10.
Oregon
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Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. Oregon is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean, on the north by Washington, on the south by California, on the east by Idaho, the Columbia River delineates much of Oregons northern boundary, and the Snake River delineates much of the eastern boundary. The parallel 42° north delineates the boundary with California and Nevada. Oregon was inhabited by indigenous tribes before Western traders, explorers. An autonomous government was formed in the Oregon Country in 1843 before the Oregon Territory was created in 1848, Oregon became the 33rd state on February 14,1859. Today, at 98,000 square miles, Oregon is the ninth largest and, with a population of 4 million, the capital of Oregon is Salem, the second most populous of its cities, with 164,549 residents. Portland is Oregons most populous city, with 632,309 residents, Portlands metro population of 2,389,228 ranks the 23rd largest metro in the nation. The Willamette Valley in western Oregon is the states most densely populated area, the tall conifers, mainly Douglas fir, along Oregons rainy west coast contrast with the lighter-timbered and fire-prone pine and juniper forests covering portions to the east. Abundant alders in the west fix nitrogen for the conifers, stretching east from central Oregon are semi-arid shrublands, prairies, deserts, steppes, and meadows. At 11,249 feet, Mount Hood is the states highest point, Oregons only national park, Crater Lake National Park, comprises the caldera surrounding Crater Lake, the deepest lake in the United States. The state is home to the single largest organism in the world, Armillaria ostoyae. Because of its landscapes and waterways, Oregons economy is largely powered by various forms of agriculture, fishing. It is also the top timber-producer of the lower 48 states, Technology is another one of the states major economic forces, which began in the 1970s with the establishment of the Silicon Forest and the expansion of Tektronix and Intel. Sportswear company Nike, Inc. headquartered in Beaverton, is the states largest public corporation with a revenue of $30.6 billion. The earliest evidence of the name Oregon has Spanish origins and this chronicle is the first topographical and linguistic source with respect to the place name Oregon. There are also two other sources with Spanish origins such as the name Oregano which grows in the part of the region. Another early use of the name, spelled Ouragon, was in a 1765 petition by Major Robert Rogers to the Kingdom of Great Britain, the term referred to the then-mythical River of the West. By 1778 the spelling had shifted to Oregon, in his 1765 petition, Rogers wrote, The rout. is from the Great Lakes towards the Head of the Mississippi, and from thence to the River called by the Indians Ouragon
11.
International Workers' Day
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Being a traditional European spring celebration, May Day is a national public holiday in several European countries. The date is currently celebrated specifically as Labour Day or International Workers Day in the majority of countries, some countries celebrate a Labour Day on other dates significant to them, such as the United States, which celebrates Labor Day on the first Monday of September. Beginning in the late 19th century, as the union and labour movements grew. In the United States and Canada, a September holiday, called Labor or Labour Day, was first proposed in the 1880s. In 1882, Matthew Maguire, a machinist, first proposed a Labor Day holiday on the first Monday of September while serving as secretary of the Central Labor Union of New York. Others argue that it was first proposed by Peter J. McGuire of the American Federation of Labor in May 1882, after witnessing the annual festival held in Toronto. In 1887, Oregon was the first state of the United States to make it a public holiday. By the time it became a federal holiday in 1894. Thus by 1887 in North America, Labor Day was an established, official holiday but in September,1 May was chosen to be International Workers Day to commemorate the 4 May 1886 Haymarket affair in Chicago. The police were trying to disperse an assembly during a general strike for the eight-hour workday. The police responded by firing on the workers, killing four demonstrators, the following day on 5 May in Milwaukee Wisconsin, the state militia fired on a crowd of strikers killing seven, including a schoolboy and a man feeding chickens in his yard. May Day was formally recognised as an event at the Internationals second congress in 1891. Subsequently, the May Day riots of 1894 occurred, the congress made it mandatory upon the proletarian organisations of all countries to stop work on 1 May, wherever it is possible without injury to the workers. May Day has long been a point for demonstrations by various socialist, communist and anarchist groups. May Day is one of the most important holidays in countries such as the Peoples Republic of China, North Korea, Cuba. May Day celebrations in these countries typically feature elaborate workforce parades, in 1955, the Catholic Church dedicated 1 May to Saint Joseph the Worker. Saint Joseph is the saint of workers and craftsmen, among others. It became an symbol of that period
12.
May Day
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May Day is a public holiday usually celebrated on May 1. It is an ancient northern hemisphere spring festival and it is also a traditional spring holiday in many cultures. Dances, singing, and cake are usually part of the celebrations that the day includes, in the late 19th century, May Day was chosen as the date for International Workers Day by the Socialists and Communists of the Second International to commemorate the Haymarket affair in Chicago. International Workers Day may also be referred to as May Day and it is also associated with the Gaelic Beltane, most commonly held on April 30. The day was a summer holiday in many pre-Christian European pagan cultures. While February 1 was the first day of spring, May 1 was the first day of summer, hence, as Europe became Christianised, the pagan holidays lost their religious character and May Day changed into a popular secular celebration. A significant celebration of May Day occurs in Germany where it is one of days on which St. Walburga. The secular versions of May Day, observed in Europe and America, may be best known for their traditions of dancing around the maypole and crowning the Queen of May. Fading in popularity since the late 20th century is the giving of May baskets, small baskets of sweets or flowers, usually left anonymously on neighbours doorsteps. May 1 is also one of two feast days of the Catholic patron saint of workers St Joseph the Worker, a carpenter, husband to Mother Mary, and surrogate father of Jesus. Replacing another feast to St. Joseph, this date was chosen by Pope Pius XII in 1955 as a counterpoint to the communist International Workers Day celebrations on May Day. In the late 20th century, many neopagans began reconstructing traditions, traditional English May Day rites and celebrations include crowning a May Queen and celebrations involving a maypole. Historically, Morris dancing has been linked to May Day celebrations, much of this tradition derives from the pagan Anglo-Saxon customs held during Þrimilci-mōnaþ along with many Celtic traditions. May Day has been a day of festivities throughout the centuries. May Day is most associated with towns and villages celebrating springtime fertility and revelry with village fetes, seeding has been completed by this date and it was convenient to give farm labourers a day off. Perhaps the most significant of the traditions is the maypole, around which traditional dancers circle with ribbons, the spring bank holiday on the first Monday in May was created in 1978, May Day itself – May 1 – is not a public holiday in England. Unlike the other Bank Holidays and common law holidays, the first Monday in May is taken off from schools by itself and this is because it has no Christian significance and does not otherwise fit into the usual school holiday pattern. May Day was abolished and its celebration banned by Puritan parliaments during the Interregnum, may 1,1707, was the day the Act of Union came into effect, joining England and Scotland to form the Kingdom of Great Britain
"Labor Day". New International Encyclopedia. 1905.
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