Date:    Sat, 9 May 1998 21:02:04 EDT
<br>From:    Bapopik <Bapopik[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]AOL.COM>
<br>Subject: Mother's Day (1890? 1908?)
<br>
<br>     It should surprise no one that "Mother's Day" is an Americanism.  Without
<br>her, there would be just baseball, apple pie, and hot dogs.
<br>     It's a holiday even Saddam Hussein can love.
<br>     Charles Panati's EXTRAORDINARY ORIGINS OF EVERYDAY THINGS (1987)
<br>discusses this on pages 58-60:
<br>
<br>     Born in 1864, Anna Jarvis attended school in Grafton, West Virginia.
<br>(...) The death of her father in 1902 compelled Anna and her mother to live
<br>with relatives in Philadelphia.  Three years later, her mother died on May 9,
<br>leaving Ann grief-stricken. (...) For two years these naggings germinated,
<br>bearing the fruit of an idea in 1907.  On the second Sunday in May, the
<br>anniversary of her mother's death, Anna Jarvis invited a group of friends to
<br>her Philadelphia home.  Her announced idea--for an annual nationwide
<br>celebration to be called Mother's ("Mothers'" is correct--ed.) Day--met with
<br>unanimous support. (...)
<br>     So on May 10, 1908, the first Mother's Day service was held in Grafton,
<br>West Virginia, attended by 407 children and their mothers. (...) The House of
<br>Representatives quickly passed a Mother's Day resolution. (...) The resolution
<br>stalled in the Senate.  A determined Anna Jarvis then began what has been
<br>called one of the most successful one-person letter-writing campaigns in
<br>history.  (Sounds familiar--ed.)(...)  By 1914, to dissent on the Mother's Day
<br>issue seemed not only cynical but un-American.  Finally, the Senate approved
<br>the legislation, and on May 8, 1914, President Woodrow Wilson signed a
<br>proclamation designating the second Sunday in May as Mother's Day.
<br>
<br>     This was quite an achievement for Anna Jarvis.  After all, in 1908 and in
<br>1914, mothers weren't respected enough to vote!
<br>      So much for history.  We have two concerns here: (1) is it Mother's Day
<br>or Mothers' Day, and (2) what's the earliest citation?
<br>      When it was passed, it was "Mothers' Day," but now it's "Mother's Day."
<br>Personally, I prefer the plural "ladies' man" to "lady's man" (several
<br>ladies), but I prefer the singular "Mother's Day" (one mother) to "Mothers'
<br>Day."  Although Anna Jarvis intended the day to honor all moms, you're
<br>concerned about Mom.  In 1914 (the year of passage), both titles were used.
<br>      A Worldcat search was interesting.  Check this out:
<br>
<br>    AUTHOR:  Sasseen, Mary Towles.
<br>         TITLE:  Mother's day celebration.
<br>       PLACE:  (Kentucky?).
<br>PUBLISHER:  The Author.
<br>         YEAR:  1893.
<br>
<br>      It beats the OED citation of 1908.  And look at this:
<br>
<br>    AUTHOR:  Pattengill, Henry R. (Henry Romaine), 1852-1918.
<br>         TITLE:  Special day exercises:
<br>                     arbor day, memorial days, state day, flag exercises,
<br>mothers'
<br>                     day, penmanship day, authors' days, statesmen's days,
<br>                     Thanksgiving, Christmas.
<br>      EDITION:  3d ed.
<br>        PLACE:  Lansing, Mich.
<br> PUBLISHER:  R. Smith Print Co. (other editions list the author here--ed.)
<br>          YEAR:  1890.
<br>
<br>      A fourth edition (four, count 'em, four!) would be published in 1907,
<br>exactly when Anna Jarvis would supposedly originate Mothers' Day.  This book
<br>has "mothers' day" in the title!
<br>      However, Jarvis must be given a lot of credit--certainly for our
<br>national holiday.  Panati has this on page 60:
<br>
<br>     Though Anna Jarvis triumphed in her campaign for a Mother's Day, her
<br>personal life did not have a happy ending.  Disillusioned by a disastrous love
<br>affair, she vowed never to marry and, childless, came to view each Mother's
<br>Day as a painful personal mockery.  And as commercialization encroached upon
<br>what had been intended as a religious observance, she became litigious,
<br>initiating lawsuits against companies seeking to profit from Mother's Day.
<br>The suits failed, and Anna Jarvis became a recluse.  Within a short time, she
<br>exhausted her savings and lost her family home; a blind sister, Elsinore, to
<br>whom she had devoted her life, died.  These misfortunes undermined her own
<br>health, and in November 1944 she was forced to seek public assistance.
<br>Realizing her desperate plight, friends provided funds so she could spend her
<br>final years in a private sanitarium.  Deaf, ailing, and nearly blind, the
<br>woman whose efforts brought happiness to countless mothers died in 1948,
<br>childless and alone, at the age of eighty-four.
<br>
<br>      AMERICA IN SO MANY WORDS doesn't include "Mother's Day."  The word-of-
<br>the-year for 1908 is "asleep at the switch."
<br>