by sherry mann
Although mothers are certainly the one tie that commonly binds all people throughout human history, it has been celebrated as an official occasion only in this past century.
The struggle toward what we now call “Mother’s Day” began in 1868, with the work of Ann Jarvis to establish a “Mother’s Friendship Day”. Jarvis wanted to encourage mothers to fulfill their unique role which could reconcile the division of so many families as another painful result of the Civil War. Jarvis wanted to expand the concept into an annual celebration for mothers, but she died in 1905 before the day became popular.
Ann Jarvis’ daughter, Anna Marie Reeves Jarvis is credited with establishing Mother’s Day in its current form, following the death of her mother on May 9, 1905. It is the date of Ann Jarvis’ death which was the motivation behind celebrating Mother’s Day on the second Sunday in May.
May 6th, 2010 | Posted in Web-Only Content | Read More »
Julia Ward Howe:
Beyond the Battle Hymn of the Republic
Mother’s Day and Peace
Julia Ward Howe’s accomplishments did not end with the writing of her famous poem, “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” As Julia became more famous, she was asked to speak publicly more often. Her husband became less adamant that she remain a private person, and while he never actively supported her further efforts, his resistance eased.
She saw some of the worst effects of the war — not only the death and disease which killed and maimed the soldiers. She worked with the widows and orphans of soldiers on both sides of the war, and realized that the effects of the war go beyond the killing of soldiers in battle. She also saw the economic devastation of the Civil War, the economic crises that followed the war, the restructuring of the economies of both North and South.
In 1870, Julia Ward Howe took on a new issue and a new cause. Distressed by her experience of the realities of war, determined that peace was one of the two most important causes of the world (the other being equality in its many forms) and seeing war arise again in the world in the Franco-Prussian War, she called in 1870 for women to rise up and oppose war in all its forms. She wanted women to come together across national lines, to recognize what we hold in common above what divides us, and commit to finding peaceful resolutions to conflicts. She issued a Declaration, hoping to gather together women in a congress of action.
She failed in her attempt to get formal recognition of a Mother’s Day for Peace. Her idea was influenced by Anna Jarvis, a young Appalachian homemaker who had attempted starting in 1858 to improve sanitation through what she called Mothers’ Work Days. She organized women throughout the Civil War to work for better sanitary conditions for both sides, and in 1868 she began work to reconcile Union and Confederate neighbors.
Read more.
May 10th, 2009 | Posted in Web-Only Content | Read More »
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