Happy Father’s Day-History of Father’s Day-Father’s Day Internet Gifts

Happy Father’s Day-History of Father’s Day-Father’s Day Internet Gifts, is it too early to get started? Not when you have to send your gift.

History of Father’s Day

Father’s Day is a celebration started in the early twentieth century to complement Mothers Day, It Celebrates Fatherhood and male parenting, and to honor and commemorate fathers and forefathers. Father’s Day is celebrated on a variety of dates.

worldwide and typically involves gift giving, and special dinners to fathers and of course family oriented activities. In 2008, it was celebrated on June 15th in many countries. In 2009, it will be celebrated on June 21st. in many countries.

The first observance of Father’s Day is believed to have been held on July 5, 1908 in a church located in Fairmont, West Virginia, by Dr. Robert Webb of West Virginia at the Central United Methodist Church of Fairmont^.

Mrs. Sonora Smart Dodd of Washington thought independently of the holiday one Sunday in 1909 while listening to a Mother’s Day sermon at the Central Methodist Episcopal Church at Spokane, Washington and she arranged a tribute for her father in June 19, 1910. She was the first to solicit the idea of having an official Father’s Day observance to honor all fathers.

With out TV and the internet, it took many years to make the holiday official. In spite of support from the YMCA, the YWCA  and churches, it ran the risk of disappearing from the calendar. Where Mother’s Day was met with enthusiasm…Father’s Day was met with laughter.

The holiday was gathering attention slowly, but the wrong reasons: it was the target of much satire, parody and derision, including jokes from the local newspaper, the Spokesman-Review.

Many people saw it as just the first step in filling the calendar with mindless promotions like Grandparents Day, Professional Secretaries Day and other such holidays such as National Clean Your Desk Day.

A bill was introduced in 1913 and US President Calvin Coolidge supported the idea way back in  1924, and a national committee was formed in the 1930s by trade groups in order to legitimize the holiday.

Father’s Day isn’t the only day celebrated for men. International Men’s Day is celebrated in many countries, most often on November 19th.

Happy Father’s Day-History of Father’s Day-Father’s Day Internet Gifts-The Commercialization of Father’s Day

The Associated Men’s Wear Retailers jumped on the band wagon and formed a National Father’s Day Committee in New York City in the 1930s, which was renamed in 1938 to National Council for the Promotion of Father’s Day and incorporated several trade groups more.

This council had the goals of legitimizing the holiday in the mind of the people and managing the holiday as a commercial event in a more systematic way, in order to boost the sales during the holiday.

The Associated Men’s Wear Retailers always had the support of Mrs. Sonora Smart Dodd, who had no problem with the commercialization of the holiday and endorsed several promotions to increase the amount of gifts. In this aspect she can be considered the opposite of Anna Jarvis, who actively  opposed all commercialization of Mother’s Day.

The merchants recognized the tendency to parodize and satirize the holiday, and used it to their benefit by mocking the holiday on the same advertisements where they promoted the gifts for fathers.

People felt compelled to buy gifts even though they saw through the commercial facade, and the custom of giving gifts on that day became progressively more accepted. By 1937 the Father’s Day Council calculated that only one father in six had received a present on that day.

By the 1980s, the Council proclaimed that they had achieved their goal: the one-day event had become a three-week commercial event, a “second Christmas.” Its executive director explained back in 1949 that, without the coordinated efforts of the Council and of the groups supporting it, Father’s Day would have disappeared.

Spelling

Although normal English punctuation guidelines indicate that the holiday should be spelled “Fathers’ Day” (as it is a plural possessive), common usage dictates that the ostensibly singular possessive “Father’s Day” is the preferred spelling.

Dodd used the “Fathers’ Day” spelling on her original petition for the holiday, but the spelling “Father’s Day” was already used back in 1913 when a bill was introduced to the US Congress as the first attempt to

establish the holiday, and it was still spelled the same way when its creator was commended in 2008 by the U.S. Congress.

Dates

The officially recognized date of Father’s Day varies from country to country.

Sources: Wikipedia-Father’s Day

Happy Father’s Day-History of Father’s Day-Father’s Day Internet Gift. BBAC wishes all of the Fathers, a great day.