By Jermaine Broadnax
Women are revered as peacemakers and peacekeepers! So naturally, after the civil war ended in America, it was the women who were interested in celebrating the peaceful movements that came about post-civil war. “Mother’s Day” was originally inspired in the year 1872, by a woman name “Julia Ward Howe”.
Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, China, Japan, the Philippines and South Africa, all celebrate “Mother’s Day” on the second Sunday of May. Indigenous Americans paid homage to the mother before European records. Tribes have their own words for mother: E tsi (Cherokee), Shimá (Navajo), Ishki (Choctaw). Instead of giving credit once a year, indigenous tribes would hold & attend tribal ceremonies, which gave praise to the woman. The heartbeat is one of the first sounds a child hears in the womb. In some tribes, the drum was given to their people by a woman, because they would equate the heartbeat to the beat of a drum.
In 1914, President Woodrow Wilson approved designating the second Sunday in May, “Mother’s Day”. To put things in perspective, the “first major national event for women’s movement in America, happened in 1913 with the “Woman’s Suffrage Parade”. The push for “Mother’s Day” was a push for more women rights.
Is there a correlation between “Black Foundational American” history & “Mother’s Day”?
The first Black sorority, “Alpha Kappa Alpha”, was established at Howard University in Washington, D.C., on January 15, 1908. In that same year, just four months later, the concept of “Mother’s Day” in America, was started by a woman name Anna Jarvis the first official “Mother’s Day” was celebrated at St. Andrew’s Methodist Church in Grafton, West Virginia, on May 10, 1908.
Was Anna Jarvis, a White American, inspired by the sisterhoods of Black American Women from the sorority? Maybe, but let us discuss the secret relationship between “Mother’s Day” & black national movements.
May 14, 1961: Mother’s Day
The Freedom Riders were attacked in Anniston, Alabama. Who were the Freedom Riders? Freedom Riders were groups of white and Black civil rights activists who partook in Freedom Rides, which were basically bus trips to protest. The Freedom Riders were students, 17 -19 years of age. The original group of 13 Freedom Riders—seven blacks & six whites left D.C, on a Greyhound bus on May 4, 1961. Their plan was to reach New Orleans on May 17.
Unfortunately, A white supremacist mob of 200 surrounded their Greyhound bus. Smashing windows, slashing tires, and threatening and fighting the Riders, such as John Lewis. The Riders escape, but many ended up having to be transported to a hospital. Just two years later in the same state, A 1963 bombing in Birmingham, that would be called “The Mother’s Day Riot”, because it happened on the weekend of “Mother’s Day”. A bloody battle of blacks fighting back the police.
May 8, 1966: Mother’s Day
“Let Us March on Ballot Boxes” Martin Luther King, visited Kingstree, South Carolina and gave a public speech urging the audience of more than 5,000 to exercise their right to vote. King said that “people must make sure all of their friends and family register to vote and, after getting people registered, must take on “another, even greater responsibility. And that is to go out and vote.”
May 12, 1968: Mothers’ Day Poor People’s Campaign
This was one month after Dr. Martin Luther King’s assassination.
This was probably the movement’s that got Martin Luther King assassinated. He wanted to unite the country around a transformative agenda to combat poverty, racism, militarism, and ecological devastation. Many leaders of American Indian, Puerto Rican, Mexican American, and poor white communities pledged themselves to the Poor People’s Campaign.
This was a March, that would be something similar to the “Bacons Rebellion of 1676”. Where the elites are put in a situation of dealing with the poor or slave class of all colors, as opposed to dealing with one or two oppressed races, it was all oppressed people. Which is dangerous for the government. Revolutionary, Fred Hampton tried to unify whites and blacks in a similar way and was assassinated a year after MLK.
May 11, 1969: Mother’s Day
Mother’s Day Disturbance
The more infamous “Mother’s Day Riot” is another black social movement that took place on a day dedicated to the appreciation of our favorite mother. This was viewed by many as the turning point in Tacoma, Washington’s civil rights struggle. This was a riot that started because of police brutality, which would lead to the police getting shot, and the disturbance lasted the entire night.
Today in 2021, Mother’s Day is the third most popular holiday for card exchange, behind Christmas and Valentine’s Day.
