The Kooky Dame Who Started Mother’s Day – Then Tried to Destroy It: From the Archives

Mother's Day card, circa 1919.

Mother’s Day card, circa 1919.

In recent months, a number of personal and professional obligations has limited the time necessary to generate the amount of new articles which have typically appeared on carlanthonyonline.com. In reviewing the several hundred original-content articles which are rather deeply buried in the archives here, however, a number of “evergreens” are apparent. From time to time, I will be calling these up, with a link to the original article posting.

Typical Mother's Day plaque sold during of the Twenties.

Typical Mother’s Day plaque sold during of the Twenties.

With Mother’s Day coming this Sunday once again, here is an unvarnished look at the well-intentioned if peculiarly militant woman who first started the holiday.

The story of Anna Jarvis is usually told with an appropriate degree of sentimental sweetness and light.

Anna Jarvis, in the later days of her Anti-Mother's Day Crusade.

Anna Jarvis, in the later days of her Anti-Mother’s Day Crusade.

She was unrelenting in her mission to establish a national holiday honoring the mothers of America, a passion which stemmed from devotional love to the memory of her own dear old mom – and seemingly a bit of posthumous motherly guilt she felt.

Rarely told, however, is how she employed the very same ferocity in her peculiar campaign some years later to destroy the very holiday she worked so hard to establish.

And she did with support from a President and money from…well, read the whole story here, Mother’s Day: The Guilty Daughter and Mamma’s Boy President Behind it.


Categories: Holidays, Mother's Day

Tags: , , ,

Leave a Reply