THE ORIGIN OF MOTHER'S DAY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 6 May 1939, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE ORIGIN OF MOTHER'S DAY

WORLD-WIDE INSTITUTION

Observance Tomorrow Week

TOMORROW WEEK, Sunday, May I 4, is Mother s Day, a day now set apart every year for the expression of love and respect towards the mothers of the world. Almost everywhere in the world—certainly in the English-speaking world —this happy custom will then be observed, bringing joy to mothers, young and old, and joy to sons and daughters in the giving of their token of love and affection.

In its modern form of a gift day, Mother’s Day is actually an ; American conception, although actually it really revives with < this new flavour, the old English institution of Mothering Sunday. In accordance with that old tradition, sons and daughters returned ; home once a year to show their mothers love and devotion —a cus tom which was associated with the : eating of a peculiar kind of Leu- : ten pudding or cake. An Ohio (U.S.A.) school teacher I by name of Mary Towles Sasseen, revived the celebration of this day i of remembrance more than 50 1 years ago, first for the benefit of the mothers of her own pupils i and later as a day of wider sig- f nificarice. On the death of Miss < Sasseen, a Miss Anna Jarvis of .< Philadelphia, championed the ’ work and eventually interested ! ‘the Federal Government, -which i gave the day national and official i status in U.S.A. 1

President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day and ordered Government officials to display the American flag on all public building’s. The people, too, were asked to hang out flags and a white flower —usually a carnation—was adopted as an emblem. From the United States, the observance of Mother’s Day spread round the world and this year it falls on May 14, when gifts of love, will everywhere be presented to mothers—simple acts but ones reflecting deep and thankful sentiments. New Zealand has not been slow in showing its appreciation of the sentiments behind the observance of this day and the Y.M.C.A, has done much to further its celebration. Little diet that young Ohio schoolmistress dream what a wide movement would develop from the idea she inculcated to her pupils more than 50 years ago.