R. Loeffelbein's WHATCHAMA COLUMN: "Father's Day Origins"

     The first Father's Day may have been celebrated in 1908...or 1909...or maybe 1910. It might have been 1916 or even 1936!
     Most sources credit a Spokane, Washington, woman named Sonora Smart Dodd, for being the driving force behind this observance, when she stated fathers deserved equal recognition with mothers, who had been recognized decades earlier.  
     Mother's Day, according to World Book, was suggested in 1872, but didn't really receive national recognition until May 9, 1914 when President Woodrow Wilson signed a joint resolution of Congress for it. The next year, he proclaimed it an annual national observance.
     Dodd, as well as her five siblings, including a newborn, were raised by their father, William Jackson Smart, after their mother died giving birth to the newborn. Dodd began calling for a Father's Day in 1909, after hearing a sermon promoting a national Mother's Day. But a statewide celebration was first held June 19, 1910, in the state of Washington, according to World Book Encyclopedia.
     Other sources deliver other claimants, of course. For example, Mrs. Charles Clayton of Wes Virginia had promoted, unsuccessfully, such a holiday as early as 1908. But the idea gained wide acceptance over the next half-dozen years, even being approved by President Woodrow Wilson in 1916. Finally a national Father's Day Committee was formed, in 1936.
     Even then it was not until 1966 that President Lyndon Johnson signed a proclamation designating the third Sunday in June as Father's Day. And it was left to President Richard Nixon to make it an official permanent national observance.