Which U.S. state was the birthplace of Father's Day?

Washington was the U.S. state where Father’s Day was first organized and celebrated.

Sonora Smart Dodd proposed honoring fathers after hearing a sermon about Mother’s Day in Spokane in 1909. She believed her own father, William Jackson Smart, deserved special recognition because he had raised six children as a widower.

The first Father’s Day observance took place in Spokane, Washington, on June 19, 1910. Dodd initially suggested June 5, her father’s birthday, but organizers chose the third Sunday in June to allow more time to prepare services.

A common mix-up is Arkansas: Dodd was born there, but the holiday movement she founded began in Washington. West Virginia also has a claim to an earlier Father’s Day service, held in 1908 to honor men killed in a mining disaster; Washington is the answer for Dodd’s widely recognized founding of the U.S. holiday.