Spending FATHER's DAY in lockdown
Sat 20th June 2020
Father's Day is celebrated worldwide by families to show an extra bit of love for their dad's, and this year will be no different - despite the circumstances.
The day itself will be celebrated differently due to social distancing measures and parts of our life still on lockdown, but the fact remains that Father's Day will still be happening on June 21st regardless.
A usual Father's Day line up may look like waking up, having a laid back morning while being showered with love and gifts to celebrate a special day. However, this wasn't the case for the average dad over 100 years ago back when the day was first created.
Little do we think about it, but the history of Father's Day is considered long-winded and controversial. So why do we actually celebrate it and where did the idea come from?
The first recorded instance of a Father's Day-like celebration is on July 5, 1908 in the USA, where a church in Fairmont, West Virginia held a special service to honour 360 men who had lost their lives in a coal mine explosion earlier. It was the country's first ever event that strictly honoured fathers, but for many years, the service remained a one-time occurrence.
A while later came the woman behind the idea for a more permanent Father's Day, Sonora Smart Dodd. She had attended a church service in her home county Spokane, Washington that honoured mothers, and being close to her own father, she believed fathers deserved a day too.
She proposed the notion of a Father's Day to her church’s minister and it was decided that the third Sunday of every June would be dedicated to fathers. The first Father's Day was celebrated June 19, 1910, in Spokane, Washington, however, it wasn't until decades later that her idea became a nationwide national holiday in America.
Despite several verbal acknowledgements of the day, it wasn't until 1966 when President Lyndon Johnson declared it as an official celebration. In 1972, President Richard Nixon signed a permanent proclamation to declare the third weekend of June as Father's Day. Today, Father’s Day is celebrated on different days around the world. How will you celebrate your fathers day in lockdown?
