Overview
National memorial is a designation in the United States for an officially recognized area that memorializes a historic person or event. As of September 2020 the National Park Service (NPS), an agency of the Department of the Interior, owns and administers 31 memorials as official units and provides assistance for 5 more, known as affiliated areas, that are operated by other organizations. Congress has also designated twenty-two additional independently operated sites as national memorials. Another five memorials have been authorized and are in the planning stage. Memorials need not be located on a site directly related to the subject, and many, such as the Lincoln Memorial, do not have the word "national" in their titles. There is a degree of overlap in development of some areas designated as memorials, monuments, and historic sites, and their characterization is not always consistent with their names, such as whether the site is closely associated with whom it memorializes.