The highest civilian honors and the national medals: empty lines

Tested 2026

The empty lines: The nation's two highest civilian honors give this city nothing, and are printed empty together. No recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom was born in Mishawaka, raised here, or honored for work done here; the White House and presidential-library records of the medal's recipients were read against the city's names, and none matches. No act of Congress has awarded a Congressional Gold Medal to a Mishawaka person or a Mishawaka institution. The four national medals stand the same: the recipient rosters of the National Medal of Science, the National Medal of Arts, the National Humanities Medal, and the National Medal of Technology and Innovation were each read for a birth, an upbringing, or a seat in this city, and none of the four rosters carries one. The entries across the line show what is not being claimed: South Bend's ledger holds two Medals of Freedom and a Humanities Medal, all seated at Notre Dame — real honors, at a real boundary, in the other city's book. Mishawaka's book prints its four blanks in a row and moves on to what it has.

Sources:

1. The White House and presidential library records of Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients — read against the names in this history's People section; no Mishawaka birth, upbringing, or seat.
2. United States Congress, Congressional Gold Medal legislation record — no medal authorized for a Mishawaka recipient.
3. The recipient rosters of the National Medal of Science (National Science Foundation), the National Medal of Arts (National Endowment for the Arts), the National Humanities Medal (National Endowment for the Humanities), and the National Medal of Technology and Innovation (U.S. Patent and Trademark Office) — read for the city; none appears.