Mother's Day

Anna Jarvis, daughter of a Methodist minister in Grafton, West Virginia, made Mother's Day a national event.
During the Civil War, Anna Jarvis' mother organized Mothers' Day Work Clubs to care for wounded soldiers, both Union and Confederate.

She raised money for medicine, inspected bottled milk, improved sanitation and hired women to care for families where mothers suffered from tuberculosis.

In her mother's honor, Anna Jarvis persuaded her church to set aside the 2nd Sunday in May, the anniversary of her mother's death, as a day to appreciate all mothers.

Anna Jarvis had such success in West Virginia, she pushed a national campaign for the day and the nation backed her on it with a letter writing campaign. MAY 9, 1914, President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed the first National Mothers' Day as a "public expression of...love and reverence for the mothers of our country."


One woman changed our calendars.

Resource: American Minute