The History of Father’s Day
The history of Father’s Day involves two distinct origins: an early religious tradition in Catholic Europe and a modern secular holiday in the United States.
European Religious Origins The celebration of fatherhood in Catholic Europe dates back to at least 1508, observed on March 19 as the feast day of Saint Joseph. This tradition was supported by the Franciscans and later spread to the Americas by Spanish and Portuguese colonizers. In the Coptic Orthodox Church, this celebration occurs on July 20.
American Secular Origins The modern holiday began in the United States with a one-time memorial on July 5, 1908, in Fairmont, West Virginia, honoring 362 men who died in a coal mine explosion.
The movement for an annual holiday was championed by Sonora Smart Dodd of Spokane, Washington, who proposed the day to honor her widowed father, a Civil War veteran. The first official Father’s Day was celebrated on June 19, 1910.
The Man Who Inspired Father’s Day Was a Single Dad and a Civil War Vet
William Jackson Smart was a twice-married, twice-widowed father of 14 children.
Dave Roos
William Jackson Smart was a twice-married, twice-widowed Civil War veteran and father of 14 children, one of whom dedicated her life to the creation of Father’s Day in honor of her devoted and selfless dad.
The story goes that William’s daughter, Sonora Smart Dodd, was attending one of the first official Mother’s Day services in 1909 at her church in Spokane, Washington, when she had an epiphany—if mothers deserved a day in honor of their loving service, why not fathers?
When Sonora was 16, her mother Ellen died, leaving William as a single father to Sonora and her five younger brothers. And by Sonora’s account, he performed brilliantly. “I remember everything about him,” Sonora said many years later to the Spokane Daily Chronicle. “He was both father and mother to me and my brothers and sisters.”
Sonora’s mother Ellen, herself a widow, had three children from a previous marriage. On top of that, William had also been married and widowed before he met Sonora’s mother. William had five children with his first wife, Elizabeth, who were already grown when William became a widower for the second time.
In 1910, Sonora brought a petition before the Spokane Ministerial Alliance to recognize the courage and devotion of all fathers like William on June 5, her dad’s birthday. The local clergy liked the idea of a special Father’s Day service, but couldn’t pull something together so quickly, so they settled for June 19, the third Sunday in June.
On that first Father’s Day in 1910, church sermons across Spokane were dedicated to dear old dad, red and white roses were passed out in honor of living and deceased fathers, the mayor of Spokane and governor of Washington issued proclamations, and Sonora found her calling. She would spend much of the next 60 years pushing for the official recognition of Father’s Day as a national holiday.
William Jackson Smart, the original inspiration for Father’s Day, was born in Arkansas in 1842 and records show that he enlisted as a Union soldier there in 1863. That was odd, because Arkansas was a Confederate state. Spokane resident, Jerry Numbers, who owned what had been Sonora’s home, researched the Smart family history for Spokane’s Father’s Day Centennial Celebration in 2010. Numbers says that William, in fact, fought for both sides in the Civil War.
Driving a supply wagon for Confederate troops, William was captured in the Battle of Pea Ridge, a decisive Union victory in Arkansas in 1862. Rather than languish in a prisoner of war camp, he opted to join the northern cause. As indication that William was a “Reb” before he was a “Yank,” Sonora was a member of both the United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Daughters of Union Veterans.
When Sonora was born in 1882, William and his second wife Ellen were living on a “coal ranch” in Jenny Lind, Arkansas. Instead of mining for coal, William and the family “farmed” it, collecting chunks of coal from the surface and carting it to town for sale. William and Ellen sold the property in 1887 for $5,000—a handsome sum at the time—and the family traveled by train to a new homestead outside of Spokane. (The farm in Arkansas would turn out to be one of the most productive coal fields in the entire nation.)
It was on the Smart’s family farm near Creston, Washington, where William’s second wife died and he became a widower again at the age of 56. His youngest son was seven or eight and Sonora, his oldest child still living at home, was 16. In Sonora’s memories of this difficult time, she recalls her father as a “great home person,” a man who exemplified fatherly love and protection.
National Recognition:
Initial support from Presidents Woodrow Wilson (1916) and Calvin Coolidge (1924) helped gain traction, but the holiday faced skepticism as a “commercial gimmick.”
Father’s Day was officially recognized by Congress in 1956, and President Lyndon B. Johnson issued a proclamation in 1966 designating the third Sunday in June as Father’s Day. The holiday became a permanent national observance when President Richard Nixon signed the law in 1972.
Global Variations While the U.S. and many countries celebrate on the third Sunday in June, other nations observe different dates:
- Brazil: Second Sunday in August (honoring St. Joachim).
- Australia/New Zealand: First Sunday in September.
- Germany: Celebrated as Vatertag (Men’s Day) on Ascension Day.
- Thailand: December 5 (coinciding with the late King’s birthday).
WATCH: The History of Father’s Day
©2026 Dr. Richard M. Swier, LTC U.S. Army (Ret.). All rights reserved.
RELATED ARTICLE: From tragedy to triumph: How one Spokane daughter created Father’s Day
