| Fathers are often a huge support to us growing | | | | leader, William Jennings Bryan, who also backed |
| up and I know my dad has often been a pillar of | | | | Mother's Day, endorsed the idea. He wrote to |
| strength. He was there to guide me and to pick | | | | Sonora, "Too much emphasis cannot be placed |
| me up when I fell, both literally and in later life, | | | | upon the relation between parent and child." |
| when I was making the mistakes we often make | | | | Getting Accepted |
| in life. | | | | Father's Day wasn't accepted as quickly as |
| I loved connecting with my dad and maybe you | | | | Mother's Day. An all-male Congress thought, |
| do with yours as well. I hope so. Once a year at | | | | perhaps, that a move to proclaim the day official |
| least, on Father's Day, we get to celebrate and | | | | might be interpreted as a self-serving. But, in |
| recognize the challenges and struggles our dads | | | | 1916, President Woodrow Wilson and his family |
| might have gone through in helping us become the | | | | personally observed the day. |
| people we are today. This is the day we can | | | | In 1924, President Calvin Coolidge recommended |
| realize and recognize all he felt as well as all he did | | | | that states, if they wished, should hold their own |
| for us all those years. | | | | Father's Day observances. He wrote to the |
| Where Did It All Begin | | | | nation's governors "the widespread observance of |
| This idea of observing a day to honor their | | | | this occasion is calculated to establish more |
| fathers began in Spokane, Washington by a | | | | intimate relations between fathers and their |
| woman named Sonora Smart Dodd. She was at a | | | | children, and also to impress upon fathers the full |
| church service one Mother's day in West Virginia. | | | | measure of their obligations." |
| The sermon was all about how mothers made | | | | Senator Margaret Chase Smith, wrote to |
| sacrifices for their children and she realized that in | | | | Congress asserting that "Either we honor both our |
| her family, her father had served that role. | | | | parents, mother and father, or let us desist from |
| William Jackson Smart, a Civil War veteran, raised | | | | honoring either one. But to single out just one of |
| his five sons alone, following the early death of his | | | | our two parents and omit the other is the most |
| wife in childbirth. For Mrs. Dodd, when she thought | | | | grievous insult imaginable." |
| of the hardships her father had endured on their | | | | It Took a Long Time |
| eastern Washington farm, she realized that there | | | | It took sixty-two years from the date it was |
| were probably many unsung heroes who we call | | | | proposed to see the day permanently established |
| fathers everywhere. | | | | by President Richard Nixon. Historians seeking an |
| Locally, the town's ministers and members of the | | | | ancient precedent for an official Father's Day |
| local YMCA, supported her in creating a day of | | | | observance have come up with only one: The |
| festivities. She had wanted it to be on June 5th, | | | | Romans, every February, honored fathers-but |
| her father's birthday, but the ministers requested | | | | only those deceased. |
| more time to prepare. | | | | Don't wait too long to make and keep the |
| Across the country, newspapers carried stories | | | | connection with your dad. Start now and make |
| of this unique occurrence. And, the interest in a | | | | this Father's Day one you'll both remember. |
| Day for Father's increased. The orator and political | | | | |