Day 215 - The Apostrophe In Mother's Day

May 11, 2024

Summary Mother's Day was not created by the greeting card industry, but rather sprang from a Sunday school lesson overheard by Anna Jarvis. She wanted the holiday to focus on individual relationships between children and their own mothers. Anna's inspiration came from her own mother, Anne Reeves Jarvis, who was a prominent figure in their community and fought for causes like public health and reconciliation after the Civil War. Anna campaigned tirelessly to make Mother's Day a national holiday, but became upset when others used it for political causes and fundraising. Despite her efforts, Anna died alone and without children. Keywords Mother's Day, greeting card industry, Anna Jarvis, individual relationships, Anne Reeves Jarvis, public health, Civil War, political causes, fundraising Takeaways Mother's Day was not created by the greeting card industry, but by Anna Jarvis who wanted to honor individual relationships between children and their own mothers. Anna Jarvis was inspired by her mother, Anne Reeves Jarvis, who fought for causes like public health and reconciliation after the Civil War. Anna campaigned tirelessly to make Mother's Day a national holiday, but became upset when others used it for political causes and fundraising. Despite her efforts, Anna died alone and without children, but her legacy lives on in the celebration of Mother's Day. Titles Anna Jarvis's Legacy Controversies and Upsets Sound Bites "Mother's Day was not created by the greeting card industry" "Anna wanted the holiday to focus on each individual relationship between a child and their own mother" "Anna campaigned tirelessly to make Mother's Day a national holiday" Chapters 00:00 Introduction and the Commercialization of Mother's Day 00:38 The Origins of Mother's Day 01:25 Anna Jarvis and Her Mother's Influence 03:40 Controversies and Upsets 08:44 Anna Jarvis's Legacy

Episode Transcript

Guy Reams (00:01.582)
Today is day 215, apostrophe and Mother's Day.

So I recently heard someone claim that Mother's Day was merely a concoction of the greeting card industry, a belief that that's easily fueled by today's commercial frenzy. It's expected that consumers will shell out about $35 billion on cards, jewelry, flowers for Mother's Day. Despite the commercial veneer, the holiday wasn't birthed from the profit -driven schemes of companies like Hallmark.

In fact, Mother's Day sprang from a single, simple Sunday school lesson, a heartfelt prayer overheard by a 12 year old girl named Anna Jarvis, who was profoundly moved to make Mother's Day a national holiday.

Guy Reams (00:57.55)
Anna did not envision Mother's Day as a general celebration of mothers. Instead, she wanted the holiday to focus on each individual relationship between a child and their own mother. Which is why she insisted the holiday be named with a singular possessive Mother's Day, Mother apostrophe S. That was a very deliberate thing for her. She did not want it to be a plural reference.

Anna deeply adored her own mom. She was a prompt her. Her mom was a prominent figure in their local community. And she drove, she derived her inspiration straight from her mom. It was, you know, when her mom was delivered, her mom delivered a Sunday school lesson, Bible, Bible class on mothers from the Bible. And after that Sunday school lesson, her mom gave a prayer in which. In the prayer, she asked, you know, God, if.

if he could find or could inspire somebody someday to create a day recognizing. So Anna took upon herself later in life, she took it upon herself as her mission to create this day.

So her mom was named Anne Reeves Jarvis. And Anne was, they lived in Webster, Virginia. And she, this was a region deeply affected by the Civil War. Anne had had, I think, 13 children, and only four of them survived into adulthood. You know, Anna was her oldest daughter. But only four kids survived. And,

And you know, this was a tough time for them. The Civil War set the community back many years and people were divided on allegiances between the North and the South. So her mom had created an organization to try to bridge those gaps where people could learn to reconcile to each other. She also really took upon took on as a challenge this public health crisis. You know, people didn't really understand the impact of septic tanks.

Guy Reams (03:13.646)
leeching into the water supply back then. So she really took this issue on trying to clean up the water supply. She felt that moms or mothers could be a direct impact influencing men on dealing with this problem. So she created several organizations in her community to fight that. Well, clearly Anna was inspired by her mom's ability to take on

these types of challenges. So when her mom died in 1905, Anna decided that she would spend the rest of her life trying to fulfill her mom's prayer that there would be a national campaign. And this started her national campaign for mothers.

So, and Anna, I mean, I would not want to be in this woman's bad side. I mean, she wrote, she started a letter campaign that was incredible. She wrote governors in every state. She wrote the president, two presidents, Roosevelt and then Woodrow Wilson. She wrote to senators, congressmen, newspapers, journals. I mean, she got published everywhere.

I mean, there is quite a record of her writings in her letters. She also formed her own corporation and she filed trademarks for Mother's Day, proper use of the word Mother's Day, and also the white carnation flower as a symbol of Mother's Day. She never did have kids herself. She died never having children, never being married. So.

she worked really hard to make this a national day of observance. And eventually by 1914, so she started in 1905, and by the time 1914 came around, every state, almost every state was honoring Mother's Day. So finally Woodrow Wilson finally signed a proclamation making Mother's Day a day of observance, a national day of observance, which basically required,

Guy Reams (05:23.565)
all federal agencies to raise a flag in honor of Mother's Day. And consequently, all the businesses started doing it.

She, you know, Woodrow Wilson started getting credit for creating the day and and that really made her mad. Anna went on a massive campaign talking about how he was stealing her credit. But it got personal for Anna really, really quickly. You might remember who Francis Perkins was. She was probably one of the chief principals behind the New Deal, and she was the labor secretary.

for a long time.

And her and various other peoples like Eleanor Roosevelt would take on all these causes. And one of the causes they took on was this maternity center association in New York. The MCA was fighting for and trying to raise funds for bringing awareness to how many women were dying in childbirth.

So, I mean, this is a great cause, but Anna did not like what they were doing. They took the Mother's Day and they changed the apostrophe to Mothers with an apostrophe after the S. And they did that to avoid the trademark that Anna had created. So this really made Anna mad, not because they were stealing credit or changing the name necessarily, but that they were trying to change the purpose of Mother's Day.

Guy Reams (07:01.133)
They were using Mother's Day to remind people of political causes and raise money for charities. Several charities had already globbed on to the idea that they could use this as a way to generate money. So she was really upset because she wanted Mother's Day to be about your mom. She encouraged people on Mother's Day, you should go home and talk to your mom or at least call her or write her, right?

She wanted people to have a heartfelt moment with their mom as as a tribute to Mother's Day. And that was about as simple as it got. So when people started using this as a. Cause to drive funding for all mothers, this really made her upset and she took this on in a major way. She wrote letters to to Perkins asking her to resign because she was helping to.

an organization subvert the trademark that you established. Eventually people would think that Anna just went crazy. They didn't understand her vitriol thing. They didn't understand why she was so passionate. So people started dismissing her.

I can imagine Anna would have been horrified by today's commercialization. I imagine she would have, she would be campaigning even today against the over commercial. Eventually poor Anna would die in a, like a sanitarium type facility in Philadelphia. She showed up one day to the hospital completely sick and she got admitted. She would eventually die under the care of one of these mental health facilities.

So it's kind of sad to see that this, this woman that had such passion for this day would end up dying alone and without children. so I think, I think I will try to honor Anna's original intent for my, I will call my mom. but I'm also going to buy some cards and some jewelry and some flowers as well. So anyway, that, that was an interesting dive into the origins of.