I hope you and yours enjoyed a warm and heartfelt Mother's
Day.
Did you know that while not the actual beginning of today’s
Mother’s Day celebration, the ancient annual spring festival the Greeks dedicated
to their maternal goddesses is generally regarded as somewhat of a precursor to
it? Admittedly, some pundits are divided on
this issue. Nonetheless, the Greeks used the
occasion to honor Rhea, wife of Cronus and the mother of many deities of Greek
mythology. Ancient Romans, too, celebrated
a spring festival, called Hilaria, which was dedicated to Cybele, a mother
goddess.
It may be noted that ceremonies in honor of Cybele began
some 250 years before Jesus was born.
The celebration during in the Ides of March was made by making offerings
in the temple of Cybele, which lasted for three days and included parades,
games and masquerades. Over time, the
celebrations became so notorious that followers of Cybele were eventually
banished from Rome.
Early Christians celebrated a Mother's Day of sorts during
the festival on the fourth Sunday of Lent in honor of the Virgin Mary, the
mother of Jesus. However, the roots of
today’s present Mother's Day history can also be traced in UK where a
“Mothering Sunday” was celebrated much before the festival saw the light of day
in the U.S. It was expanded to include
all mothers. A more recent history of
Mother’s Day dates back to 1600s in England.
It was celebrated annually on the fourth Sunday of Lent (the 40-day
period leading up to Easter) to honor mothers.
After a prayer service in church to honor the Virgin Mary, children
brought gifts and flowers to pay tribute to their own mothers. On this occasion, servants, apprentices and
other employees staying away from their homes ― and there were many of them ―
were encouraged by their employees to visit their own mothers and honor them.
Traditionally, children brought gifts and a special fruit cake or fruit-filled
pastry called a simnel. Yugoslavs and
people in other nations have observed similar days celebrating mothers. While most countries celebrate Mother’s Day
in May, usually the second Sunday of the month, in other parts of the world,
Mother’s Day is celebrated at different times of the year and with different
customs.
Origins of Mother's Day in the Land of Lady Liberty
The idea of the official celebration of Mother’s Day in the
U.S. was first suggested by Julia Ward Howe. An abolitionist, activist, writer and poet, Julia Ward How is known for her famous Civil War song, “Battle Hymn of the Republic.” She wrote a passionate appeal to women and urged them to rise against war in her famous “Mother’s Day
Proclamation,” which she had written in Boston in 1870. In 1872, Julia Ward Howe suggested that June
2nd be annually celebrated as Mother’s Day, asking women from around the world
to join together for peace. Unfortunately,
her efforts proved unsuccessful, and she openly began to wonder if Independence
Day on July 4th could be reconfigured into her vision of “Mother’s Day.” Her
idea evolved and was later replaced by the Mother's Day holiday now celebrated in
May.
Last year, our modern-day Mother's Day celebrated its 100th
birthday. It was founded for the
mourning women to remember soldiers who’d died in battle and to work for
peace. When the holiday began to take on
overtly commercial overtones, another of its greatest champions, Anna Reeves Jarvis,
tried vehemently to fight it, but ended up dying a pauper and broken in a
sanitarium.
According to an article, “Mother’s Day Turns 100: Its
Surprisingly Dark History,” published last year by “National Geographic”: “In
the 1850s a West Virginia woman, Ann Reeves Jarvis, Anna's mother, held
Mother's Day work clubs to improve sanitary conditions and try to lower infant
mortality by fighting disease and curbing milk contamination. The group also tended wounded soldiers from
both sides during the U.S. Civil War from 1861 to 1865. In the postwar years, Jarvis and other women
organized Mother's Friendship Day picnics and other events as pacifist
strategies to unite former foes … Around this same time, Jarvis had initiated a
Mother's Friendship Day for Union and Confederate loyalists across her
state. But it was her daughter, Anna,
who was most responsible for what we call Mother's Day ― and who would spend
most of her later life fighting what it had become.”
While Anna Jarvis didn’t have children of her own, the death
of her own mother served as inspiration for her to organize some of the first
official Mother’s Day observances in her hometown of Grafton West Virginia in
1908. On May 10th of that year, families gathered at a church, which has since
been renamed the International Mother’s Day Shrine. Other Mother’s Day events
were held in Philadelphia, where Jarvis was living at that time and in several
other US cities. It was primarily from Anna Jarvis’ work that Mother’s Day
became a national holiday, as seven years later, in 1914, U.S. President
Woodrow Wilson officially proclaimed the second Sunday in May as the official
holiday.
Originally devoid of all the commercial trappings associated
with it today, Jarvis’conception of Mother’s Day included spending time with one’s mother and personally expressing gratitude for all that she did. “It wasn't to celebrate all mothers. It was to celebrate the best mother you've
ever known ― your mother ― as a son or a daughter,” states West Virginia
Wesleyan College graduate Katharine Antolini, who authored “Memorializing
Motherhood: Anna Jarvis and the Defense of Her Mother’s Day” as her Ph.D.
dissertation. That's why Jarvis stressed the singular “Mother's Day,” rather
than the plural “Mothers’ Day,” Antolini explains. However, the increasing
commercialization of the holiday eventually led Jarvis to perceive her initial
success as a failure.
“Anna Jarvis's idea of an intimate Mother's Day quickly
became a commercial gold mine centering on the buying and giving of flowers,
candies, and greeting cards ― a development that deeply disturbed Jarvis,”
according to the “National Geographic” article. “She set about dedicating
herself and her sizable inheritance to returning Mother's Day to its reverent
roots. Jarvis incorporated herself as
the Mother's Day International Association and tried to retain some control of
the holiday. She organized boycotts,
threatened lawsuits, and even attacked First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt for using
Mother's Day to raise funds for charities … Jarvis's fervent attempts to reform
Mother's Day continued until at least the early 1940s. In 1948 she died at 84 in Philadelphia's
Marshall Square Sanitarium.
“‘This woman, who died penniless in a sanitarium in a state
of dementia, was a woman who could have profited from Mother's Day if she
wanted to,”Antolini says. ‘But she railed against those who did, and it cost
her everything, financially and physically.’”
Today, Mother's Day, like many other contemporary holidays,
comes gift wrapped in overt consumerism.
According to the National Retail Federation, Americans will spend an
average of $162.94 on their mothers this year, down from a survey high of
$168.94 last year. Total spending is
expected to reach nearly $20 billion. The National Restaurant Association
states Mother’s Day is the most popular holiday for dining out. Furthermore, more phone calls are made on
Mother’s Day than on any other day of the year. These holiday chats with mom
can cause the phone to traffic to spike as much as 37%.
We can, of course, argue the points regarding how Mother's
Day has become so commercialized. Of
course, the same can be said of many other religious and non-religious
holidays. But the commercial element embracing
mommy dearest is here to stay. Retailers stay in business to make a profit,
while we have that not-so-gentle nudge to do something nice for someone we
love.
In recent years, adult children have started to take a look
at where they spend their money in expressing their love and appreciation for their mothers (and nowadays, mother’s in law, grandmothers, aunts, etc.). In some cases, help in purchasing a home, help in purchasing a condo or renting an apartment in a retirement community, or perhaps something even more personal. For example, the Walk-in Bathtub has become a product of need among seniors. Many have seen commercials about them on TV,
Internet and in print, and maybe even received information by mail. The Walk-in Tub is something many seniors
need, which may not be affordable, especially for someone living on a fixed
retirement income. Companies such as Tub King, Inc. have always strived to make
these tubs affordable for seniors.
Unlike some companies that try to bilk would-be buyers out
of their hard-earned money to buy a Walk-in tub, (read our previous blog, “Is the
Walk-in Tub a Scam?”) since its inception 14 years ago, Tub King has always
done its very best to keep both the purchasing and installation fees on its
various models as affordable as possible. My brother, Kerry (now retired from Tub King)
and I have an elderly mother, so we empathize with those who want to ensure
that their parents are safe and comfortable, particularly in the bathroom,
which statistically is the most dangerous room in the house for the elderly.
This unique, high-tech but easy-to-operate bathtubs offer
the opportunity for independent bathing, safety from falling when getting in
and out of the bathtub due to its low threshold, hydrotherapy options for
various pains and ailments that are associated with aging, and importantly,
peace of mind for users and their children.
They’re a great way to tell your mom “I love you” on Mother's Day.
Another product that mothers of adult children are
gravitating towards these days are Tub King’s new Safety Suite Showers. There
are two main designs ― a low threshold and a zero threshold ― and each comes
with a variety of options such as the drain orientation (left, center, right),
the type of in-shower seat, the type/color of tile, etc. There are also safety-designed accessories that are fitted with built-in grab bars such as towel racks, paper roll stands, shelves, etc.
In this article, I discussed the origins and history of
Mother’s Day, heralding back to ancient Greece and Rome. I also talked about
two of its main proponents in the U.S., Julia Ward Howe and Anna Reeves Jarvis.
The article goes on to discuss two very popular bathroom products for mothers
(and dads, too), Tub King’s Walk-in Tub and Safety Suite Showers.
Tub King Customer Testimonial for Walk-in Tub
If you found this
article useful, please share it with your family, friends and co-workers. If
you have a comment related to this article, leave it in the Comment section of
this blog. Thanks again for visiting with us.
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Have a question? Feel free to contact me at the number or
email listed at the end of this article and I will personally get back to you. It’s been my pleasure sharing this
information with you.
Alan Knight has many years of experience in the
antique and senior bathtub industries. His companies not only provide superior
products, they are also multi-award winners, receiving the “Best of
Jacksonville Chamber Award” four years running. If you’d like to contact Tub
King, call (800) 409-3375 or (800) 843-4231; or send an email to Alan@tubking.com.
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