250th Celebration: America's Birthday
Knowing the story of America's birth is just as important today as it was then.
4th of July: America’s birthday. This year, it’s a major milestone for America: 250 years! 250 years of battling for freedom, working towards a common goal, and preserving our liberties. 250 years of reaching for the everchanging American Dream, striving for success, and building our lives around those dreams.
From the car company commercials to the radio jingles, we’ve heard about the American Dream or what is considered truly “American”: baseball, hot dogs, Apple pie, and Chevrolet with the white picket fence around your home, red, white, and blue swags hanging on the front porch. The “American Dream” has changed throughout the years, but the foundation still stays true: giving your family a good life, finding happiness, and making your dreams come true through the pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness in the USA whether that’s running your own business, landing your dream career, owning a home, having a family, or just enjoying life.
Looking back on the last 250 years, I can say with certainty that it couldn’t have been easy to pursue the American Dream in any decade or time period, and consistently be successful. Even today, pursuing the American Dream can be expensive and time consuming. The “American Dream” terminology came to be during the 1930’s depression, when Herbert Hoover gave a presidential speech describing what he termed to be “rugged individualism”; the idea that everyone has an opportunity to achieve success and happiness through their own hard work, and that America’s freedoms and liberties pave the way for each person to achieve it. This speech was meant to encourage patriotism and hope in a very hopeless time period. It was given around America’s 150th birthday, almost 100 years ago. This idea that everyone is given an equal opportunity is what this country is founded on; the idea that everyone has the ability to achieve success through their own hard work and opportunities given to them through this country’s freedoms and liberties.
The American Dream idea was founded on this, and expanded over time to include what activities the typical American should be involved in, such as baseball, what their houses should look like, (white picket fence) what material items they should have such as cars (Chevy or Ford) and appliances, (newest fridge or stove) etc. The 1970s version of this expanded on the original idea of working hard to achieve your dreams through this country’s opportunities to include more material items and created item ads to brand the idea, as what Chevrolet did in their TV commercial.
Over time, this idea stuck and the “typical American” was now branded and attached to the ideas and material items associated with it. For this year’s celebration, Chevrolet created a retro commercial and a modern spin on the original jingle, “Baseball, hot dogs, apple pie, and Chevrolet” and included it in a new modern commercial. The idea is still around today, but has expanded to included more material items and a variety of ways and ideas to achieve the “typical” American Dream. The patriotism associated with it is also still there, rooted in Hoover’s speech, stirring something within all of us, and creating unity across the nation, no matter what each person’s American Dream looks like.
The American Dream ideology is rooted in our American identity; we cannot escape it. It’s always been there, but now it has a label. Our founders of this country had this thought in mind when they created the Declaration of Independence; the idea that every person, no matter who they are, can have an equal opportunity to achieve their own success, and contribute to the common good. This doesn’t have to mean that they own a certain type of home or car, but that they can have a fresh start, a chance, to build their dream life, and pursue happiness in whatever that may look like to them. Over time, the message got lost in marketing and commercialization, but the original patriotic meaning is still here: every person can achieve their own American Dream if they put their mind to it, and can work together to achieve the common good, just as Herbert Hoover mentioned almost 100 years ago.
If we look at this year’s 4th of July as a celebration of our nation giving us those opportunities to go after our dreams, live the life we hope for, pursue happiness, and look toward the common good, we have something to celebrate. No matter the situation in this country, as it has been through many struggles for freedom and liberties, and has maintained the ideology of the American Dream, we can still celebrate that this year as well.
If we hold on to those values and ideals, then we can continue along the lines that our founders laid down before us: to continue to make this the “land of opportunity” and the “pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness”. So, happy 250 years, America! Let’s celebrate your birthday with fireworks, family, and the pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness!
~Alyson Winn-Lagergren~
