While Father’s Day has been celebrated for hundreds of years, it was not observed in the United States until the 20th century and may not have gained attention without the creation of Mother’s Day.
Anna Jarvis was the champion of Mother’s Day, successfully lobbying for the holiday’s first celebration in the early 1900s. The purpose of Father’s Day was to complement Mother’s Day by recognizing the father’s role in parenting.
Interestingly, both these holidays had their first official celebrations in West Virginia. Mother’s Day was first recognized in Grafton, West Virginia, and the first celebration of Father’s Day as we know it today took place in Fairmont, West Virginia, on July 5, 1908.
While a time to honor and celebrate fathers, Father’s Day was inspired by tragedy. In December 1907, the Monongah mining disaster killed 361 miners, with 250 of these men being fathers. Grace Golden Clayton was one of the people who lost their fathers due to the mining disaster, and she suggested to her minister that a special service be held to honor the fathers who were lost in this tragedy.
This
first Father’s Day in Fairmont, unfortunately, did not lead to the holiday’s celebration nationwide. The two main reasons that Father’s Day failed to gain popularity at this point were because the event was not advertised outside of Fairmont, and the celebration took place only a day after the town’s Independence Day festivities.
