Someone wise once said that teaching kids to grow roots and wings is the hardest part of being a parent.
William Jackson Smart was a hero of the Civil War and a superadd. He was good at growing both.
Sonora Smart Dodd, his daughter, started Father’s Day in 1910. Her father’s dedication moved her, even though he had been divorced twice.
Spokane, Washington, her city, is where she grew up and where she came up with the idea for the first day of Devotion to Dads.
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She is a beloved Spokane Chosen Daughter.
But Dodd spread her wings by going far away to follow her dreams and interests. She was a businesswoman, an author, an artist in Chicago, and a fashion designer in Hollywood. She was ahead of her time.
She was mostly a good kid.
Betsy Roddy, a happy great-granddaughter and family historian, told Fox News Digital this week over the phone, “She had a free spirit and was way ahead of her time.”
Roddy said she did all these things as a wife and mother who never stopped wanting to grow and learn.
Among many other things, Dodd gave books and words of support to Roddy and others she cared about.
She would write ‘Little Betsy’ on them in this beautiful handwriting. She told him, “Be smart, watch what you say, because words have power.”
Dodd’s important journey began when few women could vote, and most people were against having a day for dads.
William Jackson Smart and Ellen Victory Cheek (Billingsley) Smart welcomed Sonora Louise Smart into the world on February 18, 1882, in Jenny Lind, Arkansas.
In a letter dated April 20, 1950, she said, “I remember that (Jenny Lind) was a pleasant place with lilac flowers, an orchard aflower, a sparkling spring, and hickory, pecan, and walnuts in fall.
Her father was born and reared in Arkansas, which joined the Confederacy in 1861 after seceding from the Union.
Smart, who was just 19 when hostilities began, remained a staunch American supporter. He served in the Union Army’s First Arkansas Light Artillery during the American Civil War.
As the war concludede went back treturnedm in Jenny Lind and wed Elizabeth (Harris). Three kids were born in the Union.
Thirteen years later, Elizabeth passed away, leaving the Army veteran father a widower.
In 1880, he wed Ellen, a widowed mother of three. Six additional children were born due to their Union: Sonora, then Charles, George and Henry’s twins, Marshall and Thomas, and five brothers.
They “laughedly” referred to the 12-child family as “steps, halves, and wholes,” according to Roddy.
When Sonora was 7, the Smart family relocated to a soldier’s property in Eastern Washington.
When Smart’s second wife passed away during delivery on March 2, 1898, he experienced a third widowhood.
When her father quickly took charge of the unexpected new obligations, Dodd, who was 16 years old, was permanently amazed.
Dodd subsequently revealed to family members that their youngest brother, Thomas, had fled the cold on the eve of their mother’s burial. The 7-year-old was collected by his father, who held him close to the fire while singing to him until he slept off.
In a 1964 interview, Dodd remarked, “It is not difficult to recall the twilight of an early March day at the turn of the century, when bereavement came to us at the loss of our mother.”
“Father adopted a father-mother role in raising his six children. He courageously and selflessly played this position until we were all in our own houses.
Popular songs from the early 1900s, such as “Everybody Works But Father” and “Father, Dear Father, Come Home with Me Now,” highlighted the day’s problems.
Each shared stories of absent or uncaring dads. Meanwhile, widespread domestic intoxication—which disproportionately affected men—fueled the Prohibition campaign, which resulted in the countrywide pro
the ambition of alcohol in 1919.
On May 9, 1909, Dodd attended a sermon on Mother’s Day, which was already widely observed at the time, at Central United Methodist Church (now New Community Church) in Spokane.
She approached the preacher after church, emulating her own father’s behavior.
She allegedly remarked, “I liked everything you said about motherhood.” But don’t you believe that dads should also have their day in the spotlight?
She gained support from the Spokane Ministerial Alliance and the neighborhood YMCA quite quickly and took the cause to the local press.
“A Father’s Day would call attention to such constructive teachings from the pulpit,” she said in a Spokane Chronicle article dated June 6.
The significance of this, whether seen in the context of religion or patriotism, is so evident as not to need any justification for such a day.
On June 19, 1910, Spokane celebrated the inaugural Father’s Day with church sermons and other events across the city.
Dodd favored flowers and presents, recommending red roses for dads who are still alive and white roses for fathers who have gone away. She collected gifts for the dads of low-income households and gave them out.
In 1899, she was hitched to John Bruce Dodd. She accompanied her lone son, Jack, to art school in Chicago from 1918 to 1922. She earned her high school certificate in 1926, when she was 44, and created gowns in Hollywood from 1929 to 1930.
In Spokane, Father’s Day flourished and expanded to neighboring towns. But it didn’t inspire the same national excitement that Mother’s Day had a few years earlier.
In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson raised awareness of Father’s Day by officially starting off Spokane celebrations from the White House. However, numerous Father’s Day legislation in Congress were defeated.
Dodd maintained his support for Father’s Day and attained national notoriety.
She received recognition from Columbia Broadcasting for her fatherhood advocacy work in 1939, Father’s Day founder status at the New York World’s Fair in 1939–1940, and U.S. Treasury recognition for her bond-drive work on behalf of dads in World War II.
After six decades of Dodd’s advocacy, the U.S. Congress finally approved a joint Father’s Day resolution on December 28, 1970.
President Richard Nixon, a father of two, said in his Father’s Day proclamation on May 1, 1972, “To have a father – to be a father – is to come very near the heart of life itself.”
He established Father’s Day as falling on the third Sunday in June.
Roddy, a great-granddaughter, said, “If I’ve ever seen perseverance, that’s it.” “I’m so grateful she was alive to witness it materialize and that she could be there for it.”
The day she died was March 22, 1978. She had lived for 96 years.
She is buried in Spokane at Greenwood Memorial Terrace.
In 1972, Whitworth College in Spokane, now Whitworth University, gave Dodd a plaque to honor her national success.
In the same year, Washington Rep. Thomas S. Foley gave her a flag that had been flown over the U.S. Capitol. It was another big show of how much she loved her dad.
She was recognized as the founder of Father’s Day at the World’s Fair Expo in Spokane in 1974, and she has continued to be known even after she died.
In 1987, Dodd was chosen by the Washington State Historical Society to be in the Washington Statehood Centennial Hall of Honor. She was also honored by the whole city of Spokane in 2010 when the town celebrated being the home of Father’s Day.
She was honored with a Key to the city in 2018, 40 years after her death because she was one of Spokane’s most loyal children.
On the third Sunday of every June, children all over the country take time to remember their dad. This is her most important gift.
1965 she said, “My own father never felt like Father’s Day was about him.”
“But to all fathers: You are all good fathers.”
