Mother’s Day, Father’s Day more than just about gifts

By Edward A. Forbes

The Bulletin

I know Mother’s Day is over, and Father’s Day is fast approaching, but I have a Mother’s Day and Father’s Day tale to share with you.

My daughter and single mother, Chanie, came by my home on Mother’s Day around 10 a.m. and brought me some sourdough bread she had made. Her mission is that perfect loaf made by her hands. She visited for a while and then was going to Northside Elementary to work up an activity for her fifth-grade class while she was at administration getting pictures taken for Northside Teacher of The Year.

Just as she was giving me a hug goodbye, the phone rang.

Her only child and my oldest grandchild, Riley, is working in Lake Charles; he immediately asked her where she will be around 3 p.m.. “At home, I guess” she replied. He then responded, “I’m leaving and should be home between 3 and 3:30, but I have to leave around 9 to go back to work.”

She immediately lit up, a smile so big it was blinding. So, Mother’s Day isn’t just about candy, flowers, and cards. It’s the other stuff that’s important.

Anna Jarvis was the founder of Mother’s Day in 1908 three years after her mother’s death. She held a memorial ceremony to honor her mother and all mothers at Andrews Methodist Episcopal Church marking the first official observance of Mother’s Day. In the ensuing years, she campaigned to make Mother’s Day a recognized holiday.

President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed it a national holiday in 1914 due to her efforts. She later denounced the commercialization and tried to have it removed from the calendar. She obviously felt the honor part of her vision was lost.

On July 5, 1908, a West Virginia church sponsored the nation’s first event explicitly in honor of fathers, a Sunday sermon in memory of the 362 men who had died in the previous December’s explosions at the Fairmont Coal Company mines in Monongah. It was a one-time commemoration and not an annual holiday.

The next year a Spokane, Washington woman, Sonora Smart Dodd, one of six children raised by a widower, began a campaign to establish an equivalent holiday for fathers. Washington State had the first official observance of Father’s Day on June 19, 1910. Despite efforts of President Wilson and later President Coolidge, resistance to the holiday hampered its acceptance.

Mother’s Day had already become associated with flowers and candy, and men rejected that and sentimentalism as not being “manly.” The Great Depression found shopkeepers supporting both holidays because of the commercial aspects, but it wasn’t until 1972 that President Nixon declared Father’s Day a national holiday.

Sonora Smart Dodd’s father, William Jackson Smart, a civil war veteran, raised her and her five siblings. He also remarried and was again widowed and eventually raised 14 children as a single parent. I’m sure he deserved a day.

These holidays should be more about honoring the parent or parents. The gifts should and ought to be secondary to the Mother’s and Father’s Day celebration. Love and appreciation are the most important gifts a child can offer.

(Email Edward Forbes ateforbes1946@gmail.comor send comments to The Bulletin, P.O. Box 2426, Angleton, TX. 77516.)