The Spinster Behind Mother's Day

Anna Marie Jarvis (May 1, 1864, Webster, West Virginia – November 24, 1948, West Chester, Pennsylvania) is the founder of the Mother’s Day holiday in the United States.

Early life and family background

Anna Jarvis was born to Granville E. Jarvis and Ann Jarvis on May 1, 1864 in Webster, Taylor County, West Virginia, United States of America.  Her birthplace, today known as the Anna Jarvis House, has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1979.  She was one of thirteen children born to her parents and was the tenth child, seven of her siblings having passed away prior to her birth.  The family moved to Grafton, West Virginia, later in her childhood.

Ann Reeves Jarvis was a social activist, founder of Mothers’ Day Work Clubs, and a unifying force within her community during the American Civil War.  As a woman who was also defined by her faith, she was very active within the Andrews Methodist Episcopal Church community. It was during one of her Sunday school lessons in 1876 that Anna Jarvis allegedly found her inspiration for Mother’s Day, as Ann closed the lesson with a prayer, stating,

“I hope and pray that someone, sometime, will found a memorial mothers day commemorating her for the matchless service she renders to humanity in every field of life. She is entitled to it.”

—Ann Reeves Jarvis

At the encouragement of her mother, Anna Jarvis attended college and was awarded a diploma for the completion of two years of course work at the Augusta Female Seminary in Staunton, Virginia, today known as Mary Baldwin College.  Jarvis returned to Grafton to work in the public school system, additionally joining her mother as an active church member, maintaining a close link to her mother.  After her uncle, Dr. James Edmund Reeves, persuaded her to move to Chattanooga, Tennessee, Jarvis worked there as a bank teller for a year. The following year, Jarvis again moved, this time to live with her brother in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in spite of her mother’s urging to return to Grafton.  Jarvis was successful in Philadelphia, taking a position at Fidelity Mutual Life Insurance Company, where she became the agency’s first female literary and advertising editor. Another of her accomplishments was becoming a shareholder in The Quaker City Cab Company, which was her brother’s business.

Even while she was away from Grafton, Anna Jarvis maintained a close correspondence with her mother. Ann Reeves Jarvis was proud of her daughter’s achievements and the letters themselves served to keep mother and daughter closely linked.  After the death of Jarvis’ father, Granville, in 1902, she urged her mother to move to Philadelphia to stay with her and her brother.  Both brother and sister worried about their mother’s health and Ann Reeves Jarvis ultimately agreed to move to Philadelphia in 1904 when her heart problems necessitated it.  Jarvis spent the majority of her time taking care of her mother as Ann Reeves Jarvis' health declined; however, the elder Jarvis ultimately died on May 9, 1905, survived by four children.

Movement towards Mother’s Day

On May 10, 1908, three years after her mother's death, Jarvis held a memorial ceremony to honor her mother and all mothers at Andrews Methodist Episcopal Church, today the International Mother’s Day Shrine, in Grafton, West Virginia, marking the first official observance of Mother's Day.  The International Mother's Day Shrine has been a designated National Historic Landmark since October 5, 1992.  Although Jarvis did not attend this service, she sent a telegram that described the significance of the day as well as five hundred white carnations for all who attended the service.  As she spoke in Philadelphia at the Wanamaker’s Store Auditorium, she moved her audience with the power of her speech.

In the ensuing years, Anna Jarvis embarked upon a campaign to make "Mother's Day" a recognized holiday. She spent a significant amount of time writing to countless business executives, church groups, and politicians at the state and national level to promote the commemorative day.  Jarvis was singularly dedicated throughout this process, resigning her position at Fidelity Mutual and incorporating the Mother’s Day International Association (MDIA) in 1912 to encourage national and international recognition of the day.  During her campaign, the holiday spread throughout every U.S. state and numerous foreign countries, including Canada, Mexico, China, Japan, and throughout South America and Africa.  After her persistent efforts, Mother’s Day was finally proclaimed a national holiday in 1914 by President Woodrow Wilson.

Commercialization, conflict, and later life

Although the national proclamation represented a public validation of her efforts, Anna Jarvis always believed herself to be the leader of the commemorative day and therefore maintained her established belief in the sentimental significance of the day to honor all mothers and motherhood.  Jarvis valued the symbolism of such tangible items as the white carnation emblem, which she described as,

“Its whiteness is to symbolize the truth, purity and broad-charity of mother love; its fragrance, her memory, and her prayers. The carnation does not drop its petals, but hugs them to its heart as it dies, and so, too, mothers hug their children to their hearts, their mother love never dying. When I selected this flower, I was remembering my mother’s bed of white pinks.

—Anna Jarvis

Jarvis therefore frequently referred to her mother’s memory during her efforts to maintain the sentimental heart of the day while also maintaining her own role as the founder of the holiday. In addition to her efforts to maintain her position and recognition as the holiday’s founder, Jarvis struggled against forces of commercialization that overwhelmed her original message. Among some of these forces were the confection, floral and greeting card industry.  Ironically, symbols that she had valued for their sentimentality, such as the white carnation, easily became commodified and commercialized. By the 1920s, as the floral industry continued increasing prices of white carnations and then introduced red carnations to meet the demand for the flower, Anna Jarvis’ original symbols began to become re-appropriated, such as the red carnation representing living mothers and the white carnation honoring deceased mothers. She attempted to counter these commercial forces, creating a badge with a Mother’s Day emblem as a less ephemeral alternative to the white carnation.  Her negative opinion of these commercial forces was evident in her contemporary commentary, saying,

“A printed card means nothing except that you are too lazy to write to the woman who has done more for you than anyone in the world. And candy! You take a box to Mother—and then eat most of it yourself. A pretty sentiment.”

—Anna Jarvis.

However, all of her efforts to fight to hold on to her original day led to her own economic hardship. While others profited from the day, Jarvis did not, and spent many of the later years of her life with her sister Lillie and, by 1944, was placed in the Marshall Square Sanitarium in West Chester, Pennsylvania.  Anna Jarvis ultimately died on November 24, 1948 and was buried next to her mother, sister, and brother and was buried at West Laurel Hill Cemetery, near Philadelphia, in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania.  Although the Anna M. Jarvis Committee had supported her and helped to continue on her movement during her the period of her declining health, it ultimately disbanded with the assurance that the Jarvis family gravesite remained under the care of the only heir to the estate, her oldest brother's granddaughter, as Anna Jarvis had never married nor did she have any children.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Jarvis

Afterword by the Blog Author

Perhaps this is the story of a dedicated and hard-working daughter honoring her mother and that mother’s prayer for a day dedicated to all mothers.  But there’s something about this story that isn’t right.  It’s jarring.  It sounds almost like fiction, specifically, it reads like a minor work of absurdist theater.

Maybe her mother was pompous and self-glorifying.  Her strong-willed, pushy daughter does get the holiday established, but she herself is a childless spinster who dies in poverty, after decades of sarcastic arguments that she wages with florists and greeting card companies!

Anna Jarvis was a strong-willed and determined soul.  But the whole goddamned story of her life doesn’t smell right.  Not at all.  Something is missing here.