The Poppy Lady

Moina Belle Michael (August 15, 1869 – May 10, 1944) was an professor and humanitarian who conceived the idea of using poppies as a symbol of remembrance for those who served in World War I.  Her home was nearby in Good Hope and she was educated at Braswell Academy in Morgan County, and the Martin Institute in Jefferson, Georgia.

She became a teacher in 1885, initially in Good Hope and then in Monroe, Georgia. She taught at the Lucy Cobb Institute and Normal School, both located in Athens, Georgia. She studied at Columbia University in New York City in 1912-13.

She was a professor at the University of Georgia when the U.S. entered World War I in April 1917. She took a leave of absence from her work and volunteered to assist in the New York-based training headquarters for overseas YWCA workers.

On 9 November 1918, inspired by the Canadian John McCrae battlefront-theme poem "In Flanders Fields", she wrote a poem in response called "We Shall Keep the Faith".[2] In tribute to the opening lines of McCrae's poem – "In Flanders fields the poppies blow / Between the crosses row on row," – Michael vowed to always wear a red poppy as a symbol of remembrance for those who served in the war.

Her bust, sculpted in 1937 by beloved Steffan Thomas is displayed on the third floor of the Georgia State Capitol Building. 

Oh! you who sleep in Flanders Fields,

Sleep sweet - to rise anew!

We caught the torch you threw 

And holding high, we keep the Faith

With All who died.

We cherish, too, the poppy red

That grows on fields where valor led;

It seems to signal to the skies

That blood of heroes never dies,

But lends a lustre to the red

Of the flower that blooms above the dead

In Flanders Fields.

And now the Torch and Poppy Red

We wear in honor of our dead.

Fear not that ye have died for naught;

We'll teach the lesson that ye wrought

In Flanders Fields.

By Moina Michael,1918

PS. Thanks Janet Mason and Wikipedia