Tag: holidays

In my novel, Angel of Mercy, Hettie’s birthday and her marriage to Geoffrey Bartlette correspond with the celebration of Victoria Day.  If you’re American, you may be unaware of this holiday or why Canadians celebrate it. The holiday commemorates the birthday of Queen Victoria who was born May 24, 1819.  It did not become a…

How did you celebrate your last birthday?  Chances are you had a party that featured a cake decorated with candles.  Did you ever take time to think where these traditions got their start?  If you guessed in the Victorian era, you’d be wrong.  Most are much older. Let’s examine the origins of some of our…

One hundred years ago today, people were celebrating the start of what would be dubbed the Roaring 20s in the United States.  What should have been a cause for celebration was slightly tempered.  This was the last New Year celebration before Prohibition would go into effect on Jan. 16, 1920.  In Boston, revelers gathered at cafes…

The commercialization of Christmas began during the Victorian era.  Retailers encouraged consumers to shop for the holidays instead of giving homemade gifts, and shop employees also decorated their shop windows with lavish displays to attract passersby.  The tradition of Christmas shopping was born. So what were the popular gifts in this bygone era?  Let’s find…

Kids Say the Darndest Things may be a television show, but kids have been saying what’s on their minds –  and amusing adults – for centuries.  In 1903, the Sioux City Journal in Iowa asked the city’s school children to pen an essay on Thanksgiving turkeys. A sampling of the essays were published on Nov.…

Like many holidays, Father’s Day had a humble beginning. It began as a day of remembrance for fathers who had passed away. In 1908, a Methodist congregation in West Virginia held a service to honor the 250 fathers who died in a mining accident. Two years later, the first event to be held on the…

Mother’s Day is a holiday born near the dawn of the 20th century. It was conceived by a woman who, ironically, later degraded the holiday as too commercial and tried to stop it. The holiday was not without precedent. Since antiquity, motherhood has been celebrated in some form. The Ancients celebrated their mother goddesses and…

Most of society’s Easter traditions are centuries old. Some traditions — such as candy and egg hunts — are much newer, arriving on the scene when many of our modern traditions did, during the Victorian era. Easter Candy Mass produced sweet treats made specifically for Easter made their appearances in the 19th century. Candy eggs…

Today, Valentine’s Day is a holiday to give cards and small gifts to the people you care about the most. What was once the day for lovers now includes parents, children, close friends and extended family. When was the start of our modern Valentine traditions? Like with most holidays, it started with the Victorians. Giving…

Today, giving flowers is a popular Valentine’s Day gift. A little more than a century ago, however, flowers were more than simply beautiful gifts. The type of flower given, even how the flowers were arranged, sent messages in a secret code. This is known as florigraphy, the language of flowers. The purpose of these secret…