The first official Father’s Day ever celebrated took place in Washington state in 1910. A young woman named Sonora Smart Dodd, who was one of six children raised by her widowed father, decided that the U.S. needed a Mother’s Day equivalent for male parents. She went to her local YMCA, churches, shopkeepers, and government officials to gather support for this holiday, and it worked! The first statewide Father’s Day took place on June 19, 1910. Slowly but surely, the idea spread. In 1924, President Calvin Coolidge urged state governments to … CONTINUE READING |
