History of Father’s Day

On June 19, 1910 the first Father’s Day was celebrated in the state of Washington. Though two years before on July 5th 1908 in West Virginia there was a Sunday sermon dedicated to the 362 fathers who had died in the Fairmont Coal Mine explosions. It was a day of remembrance but not a holiday.  The following year in Spokane Washington, a woman by the name of Sonora Smart Dodd who was one of six children raised by her widower father tried to start up the equivalent of Mother’s Day which had caught on. She went to local churches, the YMCA, and government officials and the following year Father’s Day was enacted as a State Holiday.

By 1916 President Woodrow Wilson was in on the celebration, and in 1924 President Calvin Coolidge urged all states to celebrate the day.

The older you get the better chance you have that your parents have passed away. There’s a good chance you might be a parent, but if you aren’t then you tend to remember the morals, work ethic, and love and support your father and mother instilled in you. The following story is a good example of a man who found his greatest achievement was being a great dad to two young sons.

Story of a Great Father named Ron

Modern Parents sometimes veer away from the traditional paths of their parents and forge new ways and traditions. This is okay as long as their children learn right from wrong, are loved in a caring and supportive environment..

I met Ron at college, we were rivals and we didn’t really get along, when I transferred to the U of MN to finish my degree I would see what the guys on my old floor at Iowa State were doing on our Facebook Page.  Ron graduated and he and his wife moved around quite a bit from Iowa to various states and then they moved to Montreal, Quebec Canada. They had 2 little boys and then Ron made a decision that he would stay home and take care of them as his wife, an engineer, made a lot more money than he did.

On Facebook posts from Ron you would see various stages in the development of his 2 boys. They were a year apart but they looked to be almost twins.

Then they moved to Tennessee. Moving around can be tough on kids as they have to say good bye to friends they made and make new ones in the new city.  Ron filled in until his boys made new friends.

Ron had dropped out of his engineering course work in college after his second year but his ability to create things that didn’t exist before was a skill that really shined when he made Halloween costumes for his two sons, or made pirate outfits for the 2 boys to play in style. I remember seeing wearable fire trucks that were suspended around them using backpack straps. They wore fire hats to complete the costume.

He was the Deluxe version of Mr Mom.

Ron got Sick

I don’t know exactly what the name of the illness was but Ron had something like pneumonia, where he had a hard time breathing and then it affected his heart.  There would be days where he could barely breathe, and yet he would post a story about his sons on the Facebook Page.

There would be Prayer Chains from alumni from our floor at Friley Hall in Ames Iowa for Ron. He saw countless doctors and specialists and he had a great amount of hope he would pull through.

I sent him an email one day saying I was sorry for the way I was in college and that I had admired him for being such a great dad to his 2 sons.  Ron replied that people make mistakes, there are misunderstandings and he said he too did stupid things back then. He paid me a compliment about something I had done then. Then I said something that made him feel better, perhaps in his soul, as his body was not responding the way it should have.

I said that his sons will grow up to be wonderful adults, great fathers like he is to them, because he showed them kindness, generosity, being supportive on their worst day, and that he loved them by spoken word and by deed.  Ron appreciated these kind words.

A month later Ron passed away at the age of 49.  I regret not getting to know him better in college, but seeing him excel at the one job he was second to none, being a Dad, inspired me greatly.

I lost my dad 22 yrs ago this July, and on Father’s Day I tend to celebrate other fathers as I’m not a father yet. I always remember Ron on this day.  I hope you honor your father or someone’s father on this Sunday and show them how great a job they have done being a father.

Happy Father’s Day!!

This Sunday we celebrate the second of 3 traditional holidays that celebrate the Family. Last month we celebrated Mothers, this month we celebrate Fathers, and in September we celebrate Grandparents. That’s tradition. Our website administrator has added some other family holidays to include the entire family from May through October, so be looking for next month’s installment of #ProLifeSunday when we celebrate Aunts & Uncles Day.