How mom got her day

Newsweek ^ | May 9, 2008 | James Lochart

[moderatewolverine]

It may seem as if Mother's Day was invented by FTD and Hallmark, but people have been taking time on the calendar to give a shout-out to Mom for a long time. The Greeks and Romans had mother goddess festivals—although their celebrations didn't involve the menfolk taking their underappreciated mothers out to dinner. A more recent tradition was Mothering Sunday, which developed in the British Isles during the 16th century. On the fourth Sunday during Lent young men and women who were living and working apart from their families were allowed to return to their "mother churches," which usually meant seeing Mom again, too.

Mother's Day as it is observed in the United States started in the 1850s with Ann Jarvis, a West Virginia woman who held "Mothers' Work Days" to promote health and hygiene at home and in the workplace. During the Civil War, Jarvis organized women to improve sanitary conditions for soldiers on both sides, and after the war she became a pacifist, furthering the cause by bringing together mothers of Union and Confederate soldiers and promoting a Mother's Day holiday that had explicit pacifist overtones.