10-12-2025 12:27am

DAR Celebrates Its 135 Anniversary

Beth Callahan Editor

LEBANON, OH -- Today I had the pleasure of speaking to the Turtle Creek Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution about the WarrenCountyPost.com, totally unaware that it was DAR's 135th anniversary. Here is what I learned....

DAR was founded on October 11, 1890 by four women: Eugenia Washington, Mary Virginia (Jennie) Hawes, Anna (Annie) Smith and Caroline Lee. They formed their own organization to preserve the memory of the American Revolution and to promote patriotism, education, and historic preservation after they were excluded from the Sons of the American Revolution.

The first President General was Caroline Scott Harrison, wife of the U.S. President Benjamin Harrison. She helped the organization establish its initial goals, which included the organization's initial project to build a monument to George Washington in Paris. On July 3, 1900 a bronze statue of Washington on horseback, sculpted by Daniel Chester French, was inaugurated. The text of the statue reads: "gift of the women of the United States of America in memory of the brotherly help given by France to their fathers in the fight for Independence."

For the past 130 years DAR's objectives have stayed the same:

Historical - to perpetuate the memory and spirit of the men and women who achieved American Independence;
Educational - to carry out the injunction of Washington in his farewell address to the American people, "to promote, as an object of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge, thus developing an enlightened public opinion…"; and
Patriotic - to cherish, maintain, and extend the institutions of American freedom, to foster true patriotism and love of country, and to aid in securing for mankind all the blessings of liberty.

Today, according to the Daughters of the American Revolution National Society's website, www.dar.org, there are close to 3,000 DAR chapters across the United States and internationally with approximately 175,000 to 190,000 members spread across these chapters. Ohio, alone, boasts 95 DAR Chapters with four here in Warren County: