{"id":21150,"date":"2016-04-27T17:27:03","date_gmt":"2016-04-27T21:27:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/philadelphiaencyclopedia.org\/?p=21150"},"modified":"2023-05-19T15:47:04","modified_gmt":"2023-05-19T19:47:04","slug":"mothers-day","status":"publish","type":"egp_essays","link":"https:\/\/philadelphiaencyclopedia.org\/essays\/mothers-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Mother\u2019s Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

First rising to popularity in Philadelphia, Mother’s Day has been formally observed on the second Sunday in May since 1914 and celebrated in the United States for even longer. Serving various purposes since the late nineteenth century, Mother\u2019s Day has deep connections to religion, war, feminism, and consumerism. For over a century, the meaning and purpose of Mother\u2019s Day has been used and contested to celebrate individual mothers, enfranchise women, boost congregation numbers, and sell goods, among other purposes.<\/p>\n

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The formal celebration of Mother\u2019s Day in the United States is often attributed to Anna Jarvis, who lived in Philadelphia as an adult, shown here in around 1900. (Historical Society of Pennsylvania<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The formal celebration of Mother\u2019s Day in the United States is often attributed to Anna Jarvis (1864-1948), a Philadelphia woman determined to commemorate her own mother with a national observance. However, Jarvis was not the first woman to propose a holiday honoring mothers, nor the first woman to engage Philadelphia society in the holiday\u2019s celebration. In 1870, thirty years before Jarvis\u2019s campaign, Julia Ward Howe<\/a> (1819-1910) founded Women\u2019s Journal<\/em>, a weekly publication in Boston, and featured her Mother\u2019s Day Proclamation<\/a> that same year. An activist, Howe intended to use Mother\u2019s Day as a call to women to promote peace both in their homes and politically in the wake of the American Civil War, which had permanently separated so many mothers from their children. In 1872, Howe called for Mother\u2019s Day to be celebrated on June 2, and between 1873 and 1913 several American cities held annual services on that day. In Philadelphia, the Universal Peace Union (UPU), a group dedicated to ending war and eradicating the American military, faithfully celebrated Howe\u2019s holiday for four decades. Records of the UPU\u2019s commemorations were kept and published in the organization\u2019s magazines, The Voice of Peace<\/em> and The Peacemaker and Court of Arbitration.<\/em><\/p>\n

Despite its relatively positive reception, Howe\u2019s holiday did not reach widespread audiences and her call for an end to war was, for many, too radical. Initially, many UPU members believed women\u2019s equality was crucial to securing world peace, but by the turn of the twentieth century the group shifted focus and downplayed the political role of mothers, encouraging instead cooperation and collaboration between male and female activists. By 1906, the UPU was sponsoring the celebration of \u201cPeace Day\u201d in the Philadelphia school system. By Howe\u2019s death in 1910 the politically active, women-led peace movement she had begun evolved into a new kind of Mother\u2019s Day, influenced and spearheaded by Philadelphian Anna Jarvis.<\/p>\n

Anna Jarvis\u2019s Mother\u2019s Day<\/h3>\n

Jarvis, born in West Virginia, was the tenth child of Granville and Ann Jarvis and their first daughter to live past infancy. She moved to Philadelphia with her brother when she was twenty-eight years old and became an editor at Fidelity Life Insurance Company. When her mother\u2019s health began to decline, Jarvis moved her to Philadelphia and cared for her until her death on May 9, 1905. Jarvis went into a long period of mourning that lasted more than two years and culminated in her newly imagined Mother\u2019s Day observance in 1908.<\/p>\n

Jarvis envisioned the day as a way to honor and commemorate her \u201cunselfish Christian mother,\u201d who gave all for her children. Jarvis\u2019s Mother\u2019s Day differed from Howe\u2019s substantially, as Jarvis advocated that individuals \u201chonor the mother of their own heart\u201d and pay no mind to women\u2019s work beyond motherhood. Using her business connections in Philadelphia, Jarvis put together a wealthy group of supporters to sit on a Mother\u2019s Day Committee. Members included department store owner John Wanamaker (1838-1922) and food-processing magnate H.J. Heinz (1844-1919). By 1908, the Philadelphia Inquirer<\/em> reported that many in the city were observing Mother\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n

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A portrait of Ann Reeves Jarvis adorns the program for the first official Mother\u2019s Day service, held on the second Sunday in May 1908 at the church where Ann taught Sunday School for over twenty years. (West Virginia and Regional History Center<\/a>, WVU Libraries)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Jarvis, who never married or became a mother, committed most of her time to the Mother\u2019s Day cause, writing letters to state and federal legislators and beseeching Congress to declare the holiday official. Although many supported the idea of Mother\u2019s Day, legislators were not keen to vote on the issue. One called the subject \u201cnot suitable for legislation,\u201d while others wittily suggested a \u201cmother-in-law\u2019s day.\u201d It was not until Jarvis had the backing of the Protestant Sunday School movement that her holiday garnered major attention and observation.<\/p>\n

In an effort to publicize Mother\u2019s Day, Anna Jarvis reached out to George W. Bailey (1840-1916), a chairman of the executive committee of the World\u2019s Sunday School Association. Bailey saw potential in a church-led celebration of Mother\u2019s Day, and in 1910 the association endorsed the holiday. Sunday school participation on Mother\u2019s Day was a logical next step for Bailey and his colleagues, as children enjoyed celebrating special occasions and their mothers highly approved of themed lessons on appreciation and respect for parents. As churches embraced Mother\u2019s Day they saw Sunday School attendance rise, and according to a May 1913 issue of the Presbyterian Advance<\/em>, the high turnout could help ministers \u201creach the unchurched and the occasional church-attendant.\u201d The popularity of Mother\u2019s Day grew quickly, and in 1914 President Woodrow Wilson (1856-1924) officially proclaimed the second Sunday in May as Mother\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n

Changing Meanings<\/h3>\n
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On Mother\u2019s Day 1918, General John Pershing requested that all soldiers take a moment to write letters to their mothers. This cartoon by Clifford Berryman evokes the spirit of Pershing\u2019s request. (National Archives and Records Administration<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In the decade following 1914, Mother\u2019s Day was widely celebrated, participation increased each year, and Jarvis was heralded as \u201cthe founder of Mother\u2019s Day\u201d in newspapers and advertisements across the county. During this decade, businesses began using the holiday for marketing purposes. In 1913, John Wanamaker\u2019s department store<\/a> became one of the first businesses to host a Mother\u2019s Day celebration that included music and flowers for customers. In 1916, an advertisement for Snellenburg\u2019s department store in Philadelphia suggested purchasing mother a Victrola, made in neighboring Camden, New Jersey, and greeting card. Printers, florists, chocolatiers and others soon followed suit and began to sell goods for Mother\u2019s Day. During the First World War, Mother\u2019s Day celebrations highlighted connections between motherhood, war, and women\u2019s political and patriotic duties. On Mother\u2019s Day 1918, General John Pershing (1860-1948) requested that all soldiers take a moment to write letters to their mothers. That same year, President Wilson commended American mothers for offering their sons to the United States military, echoing Howe\u2019s sentiments that mothers sacrifice the most in times of war.<\/p>\n

Initially, Jarvis was on good terms with businesses that pushed the Mother\u2019s Day message, especially in the early years when her movement lacked support. However, over subsequent decades as more companies used and, in Jarvis\u2019s view, abused the message of Mother\u2019s Day, Jarvis fought to reclaim her holiday\u2019s meaning by writing letters, taking out ads, and copyrighting the phrase \u201cMother\u2019s Day.\u201d She also objected to the way that the American War Mothers, formed in 1917, used Mother\u2019s Day to fund-raise and further their own cause. Jarvis became so incensed by the societal changes to Mother\u2019s Day that in 1933 she wrote to President Franklin Roosevelt (1882-1945) to beseech him to remove the holiday from the nation\u2019s official calendar.<\/p>\n

Modern Traditions<\/h3>\n
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Mother\u2019s Day often corresponds with some of the first outdoor events of the year. The families in this photograph are attending the Azalea Festival held on Mother\u2019s Day in Hamilton Township, New Jersey. (Township of Hamilton<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Jarvis spent the last years of her life in Marshall Square Sanitarium in West Chester, Pennsylvania, where she died in 1948. Despite rampant commercialization, in the twenty-first century the holiday she promoted remained a day for putting mothers first and appreciating their hard work and sacrifice. Internationally, many countries adopted the American holiday over the course of the twentieth century and many others hold their own celebrations of women and motherhood (for example, Mothering Sunday in Great Britain and International Women\u2019s Day in many former Communist countries). In Philadelphia and the surrounding region, groups and businesses offered traditional celebrations such as Mother\u2019s Day tea, brunch, dinners, church picnics, and shopping and spa trips.Activist events, such as feminist political lectures, mother-daughter martial arts classes, and even demonstrations on behalf of women\u2019s health have also taken place. The mid-May celebration also corresponded with some of the first outdoor events of the year, including the Azalea Festival in Hamilton Township, New Jersey, and outdoor music festivals in Atlantic City and Wildwood, New Jersey.<\/p>\n

The annual celebration of Mother\u2019s Day in Philadelphia and the United States can be understood as a holiday with complex meanings. Though not entirely true to Jarvis\u2019s vision, or Howe\u2019s for that matter, the holiday has reflected changing attitudes toward motherhood, femininity, domesticity, religion, and patriotism, while still holding fast to the celebration of motherly love and sacrifice.<\/p>\n

Mikaela Maria<\/strong> is an editorial, research, and digital publishing assistant for <\/em>The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia. She recently received her M.A. from Rutgers University and works as a public historian and museum professional in Philadelphia. (Author information current at time of publication.)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Honored in various capacities since the late nineteenth century, Mother\u2019s Day has deep connections to religion, war, feminism, and consumerism. For over a century, the meaning and purpose of Mother\u2019s Day has been used and contested to celebrate individual mothers, enfranchise women, boost congregation numbers, and sell goods, among other purposes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":21270,"template":"","egp_featured_subjects":[1991,2001,2029,2037],"class_list":["post-21150","egp_essays","type-egp_essays","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","egp_featured_subjects-activism","egp_featured_subjects-commemorations-and-holidays","egp_featured_subjects-popular-culture","egp_featured_subjects-women"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/philadelphiaencyclopedia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/egp_essays\/21150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/philadelphiaencyclopedia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/egp_essays"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/philadelphiaencyclopedia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/egp_essays"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philadelphiaencyclopedia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/philadelphiaencyclopedia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/egp_essays\/21150\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39244,"href":"https:\/\/philadelphiaencyclopedia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/egp_essays\/21150\/revisions\/39244"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philadelphiaencyclopedia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21270"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/philadelphiaencyclopedia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"egp_featured_subjects","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philadelphiaencyclopedia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/egp_featured_subjects?post=21150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}