Mark My Words – Father’s Day facts

“The older I get, the smarter my father seems to get.” — Tim Russert

Mother’s Day, while not declared a holiday until 1914 by President Woodrow Wilson, the beginnings of the holiday began several years earlier.

However, it would be many years, 58 in fact, before fathers would earn the same recognition.

The reason it took so long for Father’s Day to come about, according to a florist, was because  “fathers haven’t the same sentimental appeal that mothers have.”

In 1908, a church in West Virginia paid homage to 362 men who lost their lives in a coal mine explosion the December before.  Many of the men were fathers.  A year later, a woman by the name of Sonora Smart Dodd, one of six children raised by a widower in Washington state, wanted to create a similar celebration like they did for Mother’s Day, although not a national holiday yet, for fathers.   After gathering enough support for her idea, the first statewide Father’s Day took place on July 19, 1910.  In 1924, President Calvin Coolidge publicly supported plans for a nationwide Father’s Day. It wasn’t until President Lyndon Johnson proclaimed it to be an official national holiday in 1966.  In 1972, President Nixon signed it into permanent law that Father’s Day would be celebrated on the third Sunday in June.

“To me, having kids is the ultimate job in life.  I want to be most successful at being a good father.” — Nick Lachey

According to CNN and Hallmark, Father’s Day is the fourth-largest card sending occasion with 74 million cards given each year.

Out of those 74 million, almost 20 percent of them are given to husbands. Sons and daughters send 50 percent of the Father’s Day cards to their dads. That leaves 30 percent of the cards which go to grandfathers, sons, brothers, uncles and “someone special.”

Two million fathers are single. (2013)

Spending on Father’s Day will reach about $12.7 billion this year, with the average person spending about $115.57 on presents. That’s about $2 more than last year’s average. (2015)

The amount spent on Father’s Day is still less than what Americans spend on Mother’s Day — $21 billion.

Thailand’s Father’s Day is celebrated in December, on the birthday of King Bhumibol Adulyadej. Everyone wears yellow.

On Father’s Day in Germany, men drink all day at beer gardens.

The U.S Census Bureau estimates there are 70.1 million fathers in the United States in 2008. And that there are 199,000 stay-at-home dads in 2015 taking care of children while a spouse works outside the home.

“It is easier for a father to have children than for children to have a real father.” — Pope John XXIII

Here are a few “dad facts” in case you are needing a few conversation starters!

Halsey Taylor invented the drinking fountain as a tribute to his father, who succumbed to typhoid fever after drinking from a contaminated public water supply in 1896.

In the underwater world of the seahorse, it’s the male that gets to carry the eggs and birth the babies.

If show creator/producer Sherwood Schwartz had gotten his way, Gene Hackman would have portrayed the role of father Mike Brady on The Brady Bunch.

In 1950, after the Washington Post music critic gave Harry Truman’s daughter’s concert a negative review, the president came out swinging: “Someday I hope to meet you,” he wrote. “When that happens you’ll need a new nose, a lot of beefsteak for black eyes, and perhaps a supporter below!”

“A father carries pictures where his money used to be.” — unknown