Learn More About Father’s Day
Father’s Day was first officially celebrated in the United States on June 19, 1910, in the state of Washington. It then took another 58 years (in 1972) after President Woodrow Wilson had declared Mother’s Day to be an official holiday for dads to get their own official national holiday. This year Father’s Day is June 18, as the holiday is celebrated on the third Sunday of the month.
The earliest public event honoring fathers was in 1908 at a West Virginia church. It was held in memory of 362 area men who had been killed in a tragic coal mine accident the year before. It was a one-time commemoration and not intended to be an annual holiday.
The first recognized celebration of all fathers took place at the Spokane, WA YMCA on June 19, 1910. It was organized by Sonora Smart Dodd. Her father, William Jackson Smart was a single parent who raised six children. Ms. Dodd had heard a sermon about the Mother’s Day celebration at Central Methodist Episcopal Church a year earlier and encouraged her church to have a similar event honoring fathers. She had wanted it to be on her father’s birthday, June 5th, but her church’s pastors needed more time to prepare sermons so it was held on the third Sunday of the month.
Our fathers hold a special place in our hearts and certainly deserve to have their “own day;” however getting fathers nationally recognized was not as easy as it had been to get a designated national holiday for mothers. Throughout the years there were efforts to make it a national holiday but it never moved forward. It wasn’t until 1966 that President Lyndon Johnson issued a presidential proclamation honoring fathers, and designated the third Sunday as Father’s Day. In 1972, President Richard Nixon signed the holiday into law.
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