Dear dad...

SHOBHA MENON

At a Mother's Day sermon in 1909, in Spokane, Washington, Sonora Smart Dodd fondly remembered her father, Henry Jackson Smart, a Civil War veteran. She remembered the troubles and the sacrifices he had made to bring up his family of six children, on a rural farm in Eastern Washington, after her mother died. And she decided to honour him, and the qualities of strength and selflessness that he stood for, on his birthday, June 19. So the first Father's Day was celebrated on June 19, 1910.

When President Calvin Coolidge supported this celebration in 1924, a National Father's Day Committee was soon set up in New York city. In 1956, a Joint Resolution of Congress recognised the observance of Father's Day. And in 1966, President Lyndon Johnson declared the third Sunday of June as Father's Day. The permanent national observance of every third Sunday of June as Father's Day was officially confirmed by President Richard Nixon, in 1972.

It is interesting to know that in Kansas City, the U.S. there is even a National Centre for Fathering 'NCF' which is a research and education center devoted to fathering. Established in 1990 by Dr. Ken Canfield, it conducts research and provides practical resources for fathers. They even have a Fathering Hall of Fame.

Make this year's Father's Day, very special for your Dad - surprise him with a gift or a card, and say 'Thank you!' for all that he has done and most important, for just being there.

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