United States. Daughters Of The American Revolution Membership Badge, To Martha Bladen Clark

Footnote: The Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) is a lineage-based membership service organization for women who are directly descended from a person involved in the United States' efforts towards independence. A non-profit group, they work to promote historic preservation, education, and patriotism. The organization's membership is limited to direct lineal descendants of soldiers or others of the Revolutionary period who aided the cause of independence; applicants must have reached eighteen years of age and are reviewed at the chapter level for admission. It currently has approximately 185,000 members in the United States and in several other countries. Its motto is "God, Home, and Country." Since the late 20th Century, following the civil rights movement and changes in historic scholarship, the organization has expanded its membership, recognizing minority contributions and expanding the definition of those whose work is considered to have aided the Revolution, and recognizing more ways in which women and other people served. In 1889, the centennial ofPresident George Washington's inauguration was celebrated, and Americans looked for additional ways to recognize their past. Out of therenewed interest in United States history, numerous patriotic and preservation societies were founded. On July 13, 1890, after the Sons ofthe American Revolution refused to allow women to join their group, Mary Smith Lockwood published the story of patriot Hannah White Arnett in the Washington Post, asking, "Where will the Sons and Daughters of the American Revolution place Hannah Arnett?" On July 21st of that year, William O. McDowell, a great-grandson of Hannah White Arnett, published an article in the Washington Post offering to help form a society to be known as the Daughters of the American Revolution. The first meeting of the society was held August 9, 1890.