Lithuanian Independence Day

Today, 16 February (1918) is Lithuanian Independence Day - the date of independence from German, Austrian, Prussian, and Czarist Russian occupation.

11 March 1990 is the date of independence from the Soviet Union.

With my family name of Cizauskas, I honor my grandparents' families, both sides of which emigrated from Lithuania in the early 20th century.

For many years my father had lain a wreath at the statue of Thaddeus Kosciusko in Lafayette Park across from the White House on this day. He began this tradition a few years after our family's return in the mid 1960s from overseas US Foreign Service duty until complications from Parkinson's Disease prevented him.