The Woman Who Invented -- And Disowned -- Mother's Day (1914)
This Day in Esoteric Political History
Jody Avirgan & Radiotopia
4.6 • 982 Ratings
🗓️ 8 May 2025
⏱️ 18 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Happy Mother's Day! The holiday was invented and popularized in the first decade of the 20th century, often credited to a woman named Anna Jarvis, who had a very interesting relationship with her own mother.
Jody, Niki, and Kellie discuss where the idea came from, why Jarvis was so focused on it being about honoring her mother, specifically -- and how she came to regret the commercialization and popularization of the holiday.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to This Day, a history podcast from Radiotopia. |
| 0:11.0 | This day, May 9th, 1914. President Woodrow Wilson issues a presidential proclamation that officially |
| 0:17.9 | establishes the first National Mother's Day holiday to celebrate American moms. |
| 0:23.6 | The idea for a Mother's Day is credited by some to Julia Ward Howe in 1872 and by others to Anna Jarvis in 1907. |
| 0:31.9 | We will get into the details of where the idea came from and focus in on this Anna Jarvis character. |
| 0:37.3 | And someone who kind |
| 0:38.1 | came to reject all that Mother's Day had become pretty quickly. Here, as always, Nicole |
| 0:43.5 | Hammer of Vanderbilt and Kelly Carter Jackson of Wesley. Hello there. Hello, Jody. Hey there. |
| 0:49.8 | Actually, we should say also joining us is Jody Avergan, who forgot to introduce himself at the beginning. |
| 0:56.0 | Did I say that? |
| 0:56.9 | Whoops. |
| 0:57.5 | You know, on this Mother's Day, I really want to make space for women. |
| 1:01.0 | Taking a step back. |
| 1:02.7 | Thanks for letting us take the lead here, Jody. |
| 1:04.8 | Whoops. |
| 1:07.1 | You know, I'm still getting used to the new name. |
| 1:08.6 | It throws everything off. |
| 1:10.4 | So should we get out of the way this cheeky notion, people like to try it out that actually your kid's birthday should actually be Mother's Day because that's actually the most important day. |
| 1:19.9 | But anyway, we can, do you want to share opinions on Mother's Day as it currently stands now? |
| 1:26.4 | I mean, my mom used to say you should call me on your birthday because I gave birth to you. |
| 1:32.0 | And I was like, really? |
| 1:33.2 | No, we're not doing that. |
... |
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