History

U.S. Census Bureau History: Mother's Day and Father's Day

Americans have celebrated Mother's Day for more than a century! President Woodrow Wilson designated the
second Sunday in May as "Mother's Day" on May 9, 1914.

American dads waited 58 additional years to get their own national day of recognition. President Richard Nixon
signed a proclamation on May 1, 1972, recognizing the nation's dads on the third Sunday of June.

Americans have celebrated their moms on Mother's Day every year since 1914. Dads had to wait a little longer for their special day, but they were finally rewarded with a national celebration beginning in 1972. As the American family has changed in the decades since the first Mother's Day and Father's Day, the U.S. Census Bureau has adapted its censuses and surveys to collect data that better represents the role of mothers and fathers in married, same-sex, and unmarried partner households, as well as single-parent households and households where grandparents are the primary caregiver for grandchildren.

Three years after her mother's death on May 9, 1905, Anna Jarvis commemorated Ann Maria Reeves Jarvis by commissioning a special service at the Andrews Methodist Episcopal Church in Grafton, WV. As hundreds attended the service on May 10, 1908, Jarvis delivered an impassioned speech to a Philadelphia, PA, crowd urging support for the national observation of a mother's day holiday. Following a letter writing campaign that encouraged newspapers, businesses, and politicians to support the holiday, President Woodrow Wilson designated the second Sunday in May as "Mother's Day" on May 9, 1914.

Jarvis chose the white carnation as a symbol of her campaign claiming that, "just as the carnation held its petals close to its stem, a mother holds her children close to her heart." She gratefully accepted the support of many businesses for her national mother's day campaign, especially florists who donated thousands of white carnations to Mother's Day rally participants. However, once Mother's Day became a national holiday, florists, confectioners, greeting card publishers, jewelers, and other merchants seized upon the opportunity to boost profits with promotions, sales, contests, and prizes. Jarvis denounced the commercialization of the holiday. She spent the final years of her life demanding that Mother's Day be removed from the calendar or, at the very least, returned to the simple celebration of Mother's Day among families, without the intrusion of business interests.

Jarvis was unsuccessful in her bid to remove Mother's Day from the calendar. In fact, the popularity of the holiday helped garner support for the creation of a national day honoring American fathers. Months after the first Mother's Day celebration, West Virginians held a July 5, 1908, service in Monongah, WV, for the fathers killed in the December 6, 1907, Monongah Mine Disaster. On June 19, 1910, the state of Washington celebrated the first state-sponsored observation of Father's Day. President Woodrow Wilson participated in Spokane, WA's ceremonies in 1916.

Anticipating a second month of increased holiday sales, retailers enthusiastically supported the national celebration of both Mother's Day and Father's Day, despite efforts to cancel them or merge the two days into a single, cost-saving "Parents Day" during the Great Depression. By the end of World War II, Americans viewed the observance of Father's Day as not just a day to honor the nation's dads, but as a patriotic celebration of the husbands and fathers who fought in the war. Fifty-eight years after the first national observance of Mother's Day, President Richard Nixon honored American fathers with a national holiday when he signed a May 1, 1972, proclamation observing the third Sunday of June as Father's Day.

In the decades since Mother's Day and Father's Day became national holidays, efforts have been made to recognize all parents, guardians, and caregivers that make up American families. For example, Ronald Reagan made the March 21 observance of Single Parent Day a national holiday in 1984; Jimmy Carter honored the nation's grandparents with a special day beginning in 1979; President William Clinton observed Parents' Day as a national holiday in 1995; National Stepfamily Day has been celebrated on September 16 since 1997. Beginning in 1998, President Clinton included all biological, adopted, foster, and step parents in his Mother's Day and Father's Day proclamations. President Barack Obama included same-sex parents in his 2009 presidential proclamation observing September 28 as National Family Day.

You can learn more about the American family using census data and records. For example:

• According to the 2014 Survey of Income and Program Participation—the most recent year for which data are available—approximately 75 million of the 121 million men aged 15 and over were fathers. Roughly 25 percent of these men were also grandfathers. Data from the 2014 Current Population Survey found that 43.5 million women aged 15 to 50 had given birth to 95.8 million children.
• Besides our own moms and dads, many Americans fondly recall favorite parents from American television and radio programs. Examples may include, George Burns and Gracie Allen of the Burns and Allen radio show and television's George Burns and Gracie Allen Show; Ray and Debra Barone from Everybody Loves Raymond; Dr. Alex and Donna Stone from the Donna Reed Show played by Carl Betz and Donna Reed; the widowed father of three boys played by Fred MacMurray on My Three Sons; James and Florida Evans of Good Times played by John Amos and Esther Rolle; Howard and Marion Cunningham of Happy Days played by Tom Bosley and Marion Ross; Robert Reed and Florence Henderson who played The Brady Bunch's Mike and Carol Brady; The Cosby Show's Clair and Cliff Huxtable; Ward and June Cleaver of Leave it to Beaver played by Hugh Beaumont and Barbara Billingsley; Ricky and Lucy Ricardo of I Love Lucy's played by Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball; Herman and Lily Munster of The Munsters' played by Fred Gwynne and Yvonne De Carlo; and Charles and Caroline Ingalls of Little House on the Prairie's played by Michael Landon and Karen Grassle.
• The American Community Survey reported that there were 122,802,852 occupied housing units in the United States in 2019. The majority of these were 2-person households (42,095,164), followed by 1-person households (34,752,631), and households with 4 or more people (27,157,017).
• Of the 122,802,852 occupied housing units in the United States in 2019, 79,594,270 reported being family households and 58,370,842 of these were headed by a married couple. The majority of these married couple households were aged 35 to 64 (35,883,794), followed by couples aged 65 and older (21,223,428), and aged 15 to 34 (8,061,525).
• Will you be giving a greeting card to a family member to celebrate Mother's Day, Father's Day, or Grandparent's Day? If so, you are helping to support one of the nation's 112 (NAICS 511191) greeting card publishers and 20,286 gift, novelty, and souvenir stores (NAICS 453220), which includes stores selling greeting cards. During the pay period that included March 12, 2019, the County Business Patterns series found that these two industries employed 16,914 and 143,945 people, respectively.
• Popular Mother's Day gifts include flowers, jewelry, and candy. In 2017, the economic census found that the nation's 12,660 florists (NAICS 4531) employed 58,134 people and had sales of almost $4.8 billion; 21,283 jewelry establishments (NAICS 448310) employed 117,950 and had sales of nearly $29.5 billion; and the nation's 3,441 confectionery and nut stores (NAICS 445292) employed 23,097 and had sales of more than $2.3 billion that year.
• Some of the most common gifts given to dads on Father's Day include neckties, sporting goods, and books. The 2017 Economic Census found that 6,819 men's clothing stores (NAICS 448110) employed 52,930 and had sales of approximately $9 billion. Sporting goods stores (NAICS 448110) employed 236,032 at 21,415 establishments, and reported sales of more than $44.5 billion. The nation's 6,531 book stores (NAICS 451211) employed 85,006 and had sales of nearly $10 billion in 2017.
• In addition to the traditional gifts of flowers, candy, and neckties given to mothers and fathers, the National Retail Federation reported that consumers spent $29.9 billion on gift cards in 2018. Some of the favorite gift cards purchased by consumers that year were to the 253,868 full-service restaurants (NAICS 722511) and 4,133 department stores (NAICS 452210) identified by the County Business Patterns series.
• In 2019, the American Community Survey estimated that there were 21,223,428 single-parent households in the United States. Of these households, 6,167,908 were headed by men and 15,055,520 were headed by women. Each year, single parents are recognized for their hard work and dedication to their children on National Single Parent Day, marked as a national observance for the first time by President Ronald Reagan in a proclamation on March 21, 1984
• The U.S. Census Bureau's America's Families and Living Arrangements tables reported on same-sex couples for the first time in 2019. Collected as part of the Current Population Survey's Annual Social and Economic Supplement, the tables show that the United States is home to 543,000 same-sex married couple households, 469,000 same-sex unmarried partner households, and that 191,000 children were living with same-sex parents.
• Grandparents play an important—often primary role—as caregivers for their grandchildren. The Census Bureau first asked about grandparents as caregivers for their grandchildren during the 2000 Census, and in 2019, the American Community Survey found that 2,335,355 grandparents had primary responsibility for their grandchildren. In recognition of the special relationship between grandparents and grandchildren, President Jimmy Carter issued a proclamation on September 6, 1979, designating September 9, 1979, and the first Sunday of September after the Labor Day holiday thereafter, as National Grandparents Day.