A salute to fathers ( and money ) Founding of Father ’ s Day hampered by commercialization
by Kevin C . Hall | photography by Jill Stringfellow Photography
The histories of Father ’ s Day and of Mother ’ s Day are so intertwined that groups over the last 100 years have pushed for them to be merged into a single holiday : Parents Day .
Both holidays trace their roots to Middle Age Christian observances — Mother ’ s Day to Mothering Sunday and Father ’ s Day to Saint Joseph ’ s Day , which commemorates the earthly father of Jesus — but the United States ’ observances both began in the early 1900s .
As we described in the May issue of Moultrie Scene , America ’ s Mother ’ s Day began when Anna Jarvis and her supporters held a celebration of Jarvis ’ s late mother , Ann Reeves Jarvis , in 1908 in Grafton , W . Va .
A couple of months later , the Williams Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church South ( now Central United Methodist Church ) in Fairmont , W . Va ., held a “ Father ’ s Day ” service to commemorate the deaths of 361 men — 250 of them fathers — in the Monongah Mining Disaster the previous December . Proposed by Grace Golden Clayton , the event did not have repercussions outside of Fairmont , according to an article on Wikipedia . com .
Kevin Taylor , Lexi & Pearson
JUNE 2022 MoultrieScene 17