:-)

1. Hundreds of years ago, MacEdward Leach taught me that the story of George Washing and the cherry tree was a True story. It was True because Washington was an honest and courageous person. It was more True because the Folk perceived him that way. That's the image we've carried foreward. This aids to create our sense of nationhood and identity so it's important. (Yes, certain polititions may have forgotten the lessons.) The factuality was a matter for trivialists.

2. I was looking up the events surrounding International Working Women's Day, Jan 8th. Especially the origins. I found a number of historians who'd simply copied details from prior unverified publications (yeah, much like Almanacians). None had done actual primary research. That was before the Web was invented to make it so easy to be lazy, as well. The only person I found who'd eyeballed the actual material was Mr. Chase, of "Chase's Annual Events." I asked him about that. He was most contemptuous of "scholars" with big credentials who pretended to be authoritative but were merely derivative of inaccurate blather.

It made me sit up and think. In the Happy stuff, I decided to use the Folk Truths above the "facts" of historians which may not be hard & eternal, anyway. An easy choice since this is a folk forum not a history one. Thus the above gets posted on the 9th instead of the 1st. Of course, as Q gives, it could be posted both days. Both would be true. (That's also why I might post that someone was born on this day AND that one, not OR that one. He might have been born some entirely other day, after all.)