What’s Up? with Merlene

Sonora Louise Smart Dodd wanted to celebrate her father, William Jackson Smart, who had reared six children, one a ­newborn, after his wife died in ­childbirth in 1898.
Lexington’s fifth annual Fatherhood Celebration this Saturday is a continuation of Dodd’s celebration of her father, who was the spiritual and emotional head of her family, as well as the provider. He was an active participant rather than an observer.
Dodd was 16 and the eldest of the children, and she definitely played a significant role in keeping the household together on a farm near Spokane, Wash. But she wanted to honor men along with women who were attempting the hardest job of all: parenting.
The story goes that after listening to a Mother’s Day message in church, Dodd, then married and a new mother, wanted fathers to be recognized as well. Dodd proposed the idea in 1909.
She spoke with ministers and officials at the YMCA, soliciting their help in getting recognition for fathers. The ministers chose June 19, 1910, for the nation’s first Father’s Day celebration, at the YMCA in Spokane.
Having a woman credited with the national observance of the man’s role in a family is fine by David Cozart, coordinator of the Lexington event.
“The woman has always stood in the gap,” Cozart said.
In this case, ­however, he said, the woman is ­acknowledging and ­recognizing the man’s role.
“If there is the mutual ­appreciation of both agents in the family, then we wouldn’t have any family issues at all,” he said.
In addition to Dodd, two others, Harry C. Meeks of Chicago and Grace Golden Clayton of Fairmont, W.Va., also sought special ­recognition of a father’s ­contributions to the family.
But most people credit Dodd with decades of ­advocacy in getting Father’s Day observed nationally.
Dodd’s father, who died in 1919, was able to see the beginnings of his daughter’s national push. Although the idea wasn’t welcomed ­nationwide early on, ­eventually it was embraced. In 1966, President Lyndon B. Johnson proclaimed the third Sunday in June as Father’s Day, and, in 1972, Richard Nixon established that day permanently.
Dodd died six years later at age 96. A monument in her honor sits in front of the building where the first observance was held.
The annual recognition of fathers is her lasting legacy.
Lexington’s celebration will begin at 8 a.m. ­Saturday with a men’s prayer ­breakfast at the O’Rear ­Shelter in Douglass Park.
Cozart said the fatherhood movement locally is not only a celebration of Father’s Day and fatherhood but also an evolution into manhood.
Organizers added a prayer breakfast this year, he said, to bring in the element of fellowship with other men. “Iron sharpens iron,” Cozart said.
Last year, between 500 and 600 people attended the celebration.
After the prayer ­breakfast, there will be the annual march from the YMCA on Loudon Avenue to Douglass Park for food, music, free family photos and family activities. There also will be information to help men be the economic and emotional providers for their families.
Everyone is welcome, but especially men.
Just as black men have a vivid model to emulate in President Barack Obama, they also need local multi-generational and multi-faceted models, men who can lead others by their own experiences.
Some of those men will participate in the celebration Saturday, willing to give a hand up. “If we have various levels to pull one another upward, inevitably the community rises after that,” Cozart said.