Shocking History of Mother's Day

The concept of Mother's Day actually started in the 1800s with an Appalachian women's event organizer named Ann Reeves Jarvis....

Anna Jarvis continued the efforts each year until a growing number of cities across the nation observed the date. In 1914, President Woodrow Wilson officially designated the second Sunday of every May as the Mother's Day holiday. 

"For Jarvis it was a day where you'd go home to spend time with your mother and thank her for all that she did," said historian Katharine Antolini of West Virginia Wesleyan College."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." That's why Jarvis stressed the singular "Mother's Day," rather than the plural "Mothers' Day," Antolini explained.

Sadly, Anna Jarvis became disheartened by the holiday when it turned into a commercial cash cow where families were encouraged to buy flowers, candies and gifts for their mothers.

Anna Jarvis dedicated the rest of her life fighting to remove Mother's Day as a holiday and against the commercialization of the day.

She died in 1948 in a mental institute.