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Last Updated: Jul 2nd, 2008 - 21:15:22 |
(NUI) - On Mother's Day, it's customary to shower moms with gifts, flowers and candy. But have you ever stopped to think about the holiday's origins?
Here are some facts you may not know about the history of Mother's Day in America.
In the early 1850s, Anna Reese Jarvis, an Appalachian homemaker who never married, organized a day to raise awareness of poor health conditions in her community. She believed this cause would be best advocated by mothers and called the event "Mothers' Work Day."
In 1905, after Jarvis' death, her daughter, also named Anna, began a campaign to memorialize the work of her mother. She began to lobby prominent businessmen and politicians, including Presidents William Taft and Theodore Roosevelt to support her campaign to create a special day to honor mothers. She hoped Mother's Day would increase respect for parents and strengthen family bonds.
The first Mother's Day observances were in church services honoring the elder Jarvis held in Grafton, W. Va., and Philadelphia on May 10, 1908. By 1911, every state held its own Mother's Day observance.
On May 8, 1914, President Woodrow Wilson signed a bill recognizing Mother's Day as an official national holiday.
As Mother's Day became more commercialized, however, Jarvis became upset, and even was arrested for disturbing the peace at a convention selling carnations for a war mother's group. Before her death in 1948, Jarvis is said to have confessed that she regretted ever starting the Mother's Day tradition.
However, many florists, card makers and candy companies disagree.
Whitman's Chocolates, founded in Philadelphia in 1842, became one of the first confectioners to provide Mother's Day assortments, including its famous Whitman's Sampler, to consumers looking to thank their mothers with a gift of fine chocolates. Whitman's stores were crowded annually with people looking for just the right Mother's Day assortment.
Today, the Whitman's Sampler remains one of the most popular gifts given on Mother's Day, with one sold every 1.5 seconds in the United States.
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