Daughters of the American Revolution
| National Society Daughters of the American Revolution | |
DAR Constitution Hall, Washington, DC
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| Abbreviation | DAR / NSDAR |
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| Motto | God, Home, and Country |
| Founded | October 11, 1890 Incorporated 1896 by an Act of Congress |
| Type | Non-profit |
| Focus | Historic preservation, education, patriotism |
| Headquarters | Washington, D.C., United States |
| Website | www.dar.org |
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' struggle for 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 18 years of age and are reviewed at the chapter level for admission. It currently has approximately 180,000 members in the United States and in several other countries. Its motto is "God, Home, and Country."
The DAR is a historically white organization with a record of excluding African American women. 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 of President George Washington's inauguration was celebrated, and Americans looked for additional ways to recognize their past. Out of the renewed interest in United States history, numerous patriotic and preservation societies were founded. On July 13, 1890, after the Sons of the 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 21 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.
The first DAR chapter was organized on October 11, 1890, at the Strathmore Arms, the home of Mary Smith Lockwood, one of the DAR's four co-founders. Other founders were Eugenia Washington, a great-grandniece of George Washington, Ellen Hardin Walworth, and Mary Desha. They had also held organizational meetings in August 1890. Other attendees in October were Sons of the American Revolution members Registrar General Dr. George Brown Goode, Secretary General A. Howard Clark, William O. McDowell (SAR member #1), Wilson L. Gill (secretary at the inaugural meeting), and 18 other people.
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