Arbor Day Letter of President Theodore Roosevelt

President Theodore Roosevelt plants a tree in 1903.

To The School Children of The United States,

       Arbor Day ( which means simply " Tree Day " ) is now observed in every state in our Union - and mainly in the schools. At various times, from January to December, but chiefly in this month of April, you give a day or part of a day to special exercises and perhaps to actual tree planting, in recognition of the importance of trees to us as a Nation, and of what they yield in adornment, comfort, and useful products to the communities in which you live.

       It is well that you should celebrate your Arbor Day thoughtfully, for within your lifetime the Nation's need of trees will become serious. We of an older generation can get along with what we have, though with growing hardship; but in your full manhood and womanhood you will want what nature once so bountifully supplied, and man so thoughtlessly destroyed; and because of that want you will reproach us, not for what we have used, but for what we have wasted.
       For the nation, as for the man or woman or boy or girl, the road to success is the right use of what we have and the improvement of present opportunity. If you neglect to prepare yourselves now for the duties and responsibilities which will fall upon you later, if you do not learn the things which you will need to know when your school days are over, you will suffer the consequences. So any nation which in its youth lives only for the day, reaps without sowing, and consumes without husbanding, must expect the penalty of the prodigal, whose labor could with difficulty find him the bare means of life.

       A people without children would face a hopeless future; a country without trees is almost as hopeless; forests which are so used that they cannot renew themselves will soon vanish, and with them all their benefits. A true forest is not merely a storehouse full of wood, but, as it were, a factory of wood, and at the same time a reservoir of water. When you help to preserve our forests or plant new ones you are acting the part of good citizens. The value of forestry deserves, therefore, to be taught in the schools, which aim to make good citizens of you. If your Arbor Day exercises help you to realize what benefits each one of you receives from the forests, and how by your assistance these benefits may continue, they will serve a good end.

Theodore Roosevelt.
The White House, April 15, 1907. 

Mother's Day Index

Mother's Day cards most often
depicted white carnations, during
the earlier half of the 20th
Century.

       Mother's Day is a day set apart in the United States to honor mothers. The second Sunday in May has been thus selected, and the day is observed generally in churches by special sermons or other exercises. Miss Anna Jarvis of Philadelphia was the first to suggest the idea of observing Mother's Day, on which everyone pas tribute to the best mother in the world -- his or her own. 

       Over one hundred years ago the wearing of white carnations on Mother's Day was the most popular tradition aside from attending church. Today Americans take their mother's out for a meal in a local restaurant for breakfast, lunch or dinner, most usually after attending a church service, if they are inclined to religious observance. Read more...

Artifacts for Mother's Day:
Celebration of Mothers Everywhere:

• A Proclamation By The President of The United States of America by President Woodrow Wilson
• Mother's Day Bill In Congress  by Congressional Record 

Poems About Motherhood:

• Creation's Constant Love  - by Leopold Schaffer
• The Prophecy of Mother-Love - by Professor Swing
• Maternal Love
• The Picture of My Mother - by Oliver Marble
  
• A Woman's Heart
• The Voice of My Mother - by Gerald Massey
  
• Born-A Daughter
• The Gift  - by Rabindranath Tagore
• The Good Daughter
  
• A Mother's Love  - by Montgomery
• An Early Childhood Prayer -  by Eugene Henry Pullen
• Bright little fairy tales... - by Samuel Lover
  
• Soft and Low - by Mary Frances Butts
• Singing Mother to Sleep - by Richard Kendall Munkittrick
  
• Widow and Child - by Alfred Tennyson
• To My Mother  - by Charles Tennyson Turner
  
• Japanese Lullaby  - by Eugene Field

Mother's Day Card Crafts:

• Bright and Cheerful Kid - Mother's Day Card - made with cup cake liners and buttons
• Printable Poem Flower Pot for Mother's Day - stamp palm print flowers

A Woman's Heart

A Woman's Heart

God's angels took a little drop of dew

Fresh fallen from the heaven's far-off blue.

And a white violet, so pure and bright,

Shedding its fragrance in the morn's soft light,

And a forget-me-not laid altogether gently out of sight

Within the chalice of a lily white.

With humbleness and grace they covered it,

Made purity and sadness near to sit.

And added pride to this and fears a few,

One wish, but half a hope, and bright tears, too,

Courage and sweetness in misfortune's smart,

And out of this they molded woman's heart

A Mother's Love by Montgomery

A Mother's Love 
by Montgomery

I loved thee, daughter of my heart!
My child, I loved thee dearly!
And though we only met to part!
How sweetly! how severely!
Nor life nor death can sever
My soul from thine forever.

Thy days, my little one, were few
An angel's morning visit.
That came and vanished with the dew,
Twas here - 'tis gone - where is it?
Yet didst thou leave behind thee
A clue for love to find thee.

Darling! my last, my youngest love.

The crown of every other I

Though thou art born in heaven above

I am thine only mother I

Nor will affection let me

Believe thou canst forget me.

Then - thou in heaven and I on earth -

May this our hope delight us,

That thou wilt hail my second birth.

When death shall reunite us;

When worlds no more can sever

Mother and child forever.

Maternal Love

       If there is one mortal feeling free from the impurities of earthly frailty that tells in its slightest breathings of its celestial origin, it is that of a mother's love - a mother's chaste, overwhelming and everlasting love of her children.

       The name of a mother is our childhood's talisman, our refuge and safeguard in all our mimic misery; 'tis the first half-formed word that falls from a babbling tongue; the first idea that dawns upon the mind; the first, the fondest and the most lasting tie in which affection can bind the heart of man.

       It is not a feeling of yesterday or to-day ; it is from the beginning the same and unchangeable ; it owes its being to this world, but is independent and self-existent, enduring while one pulse of life animates the breast that fosters it; and if there be anything of mortality which survives the grave, surely its best and noble passion will never perish.

"Maternal Affection" print from 1846.

       Oh! it is a pure and holy emanation from Heaven's mercy, implanted in the breast of woman for the dearest and wisest purposes, to be at once her truest and most sacred pleasure, and the safety and blessing of her offspring.

       'Tis not selfish passion, depending for its permanency on the reciprocation of its advantages; but in its sincerity it casteth out itself, and when the welfare of that object is at stake, it putteth away fear, and knoweth not weariness. It is not excited by form or feature, but rather, by a happy perversion of perception, imbues all things with imaginary beauty. It watches over our helpless infancy with the ceaseless benignity of a guardian angel, anticipates every childish wish, humors every childish fancy, soothes every transient sorrow, sings our sweet lullaby to rest, and cradles us on its warm and throbbing breast, and when pain and sickness prey upon the fragile form, what medicine is there like a mother's kiss, what healing pillow like a mother's bosom!

       And when launched upon the wide ocean of a tempestuous world, what eye gazes on our adventurous voyage with half the eagerness of maternal fondness. amid the sad yet not unpleasing contest of hopes, and fears, and deep anxieties?

       When the rugged path of life has been bravely, patiently and nobly trodden - when prosperity has smiled upon us - when virtue has upheld us amid the world's temptations - virtue which she herself first planted in us - and when fame has bound her laurels round us, is there a heart that throbs with a more lively or greater pleasure?

       Yet it is not prosperity, with her smile and beauty, that tries the purity and fervor of a mother's love; it is in the dark and dreary precincts of adversity, amid the cold frowns of an unfeeling world, in poverty and despair, in sickness and in sorrow, that it shines with a brightness beyond mortality, and, stifling the secret of its own bosom, strives but to pour balm and consolation on the wounded sufferer; and the cup of misery, filled to overflowing, serves but to bind them more firmly and dearly to each other, as the storms of winter bid the sheltering ivy twine itself more closely round the withering oak.

       Absence cannot chill a mother's love, nor can even vice itself destroy a mother's kindness. The lowest as degradations of human frailty cannot wholly blot out the remembrance of the first fond yearnings of your affection, or the faint memorial of primeval innocence; nay, it seems as if the very consciousness of the abject state of her erring child more fully developed the mighty force of that mysterious passion, which can forget and forgive all things; and though the youth of her fairest hopes may be as one cast off from God and man, yet will she not forsake him, but participate in all things save his wickedness!

       I speak not of a mother's agonies when bending over the bed of death! nor of Rachel weeping for her children, because they were not!

       The love of a father may be as deep and sincere, yet it is calmer, and, perhaps, more calculating, and more fully directed in the great periods and ends of life; it cannot descend to those minutiae of affection, those watchful cares for the minor comforts and gratifications of existence, which a mother, from the finer sensibilities of her nature, can more readily appreciate.

       The pages of history abound with the records of maternal love in every age and clime, and every rank of life ; but it is a lesson of never-ending presence, which the heart can feel and acknowledge, and needs not example to teach how to venerate.

       Can there be a being so vile and odious, so dead to nature's impulse, who, in return for constant care, such unvarying kindness, can willingly or heedlessly wound the heart that cherished him, and forsake the lonely one who nursed and sheltered him; who can madly sever the sweetest bonds of human union, and bring down the gray hairs of his parents with sorrow to the grave; who can leave them in their old age to solitude and poverty, while he wantons in the pride of undeserved prosperity?

       If there be, why let him abjure the name of man and herd with the beasts that perish, or let him feel to distraction that worst of human miseries.

"How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is
To have a thankless child." - Shakespeare.  

"A babe is a mother's anchor." - Beecher

Japanese Lullaby

Japanese Lullaby 

by Eugene Field

Sleep, little pigeon, and fold your wings,-

Little blue pigeon with velvet eyes;

Sleep to the singing of mother-bird swinging-

Swinging the nest where her little one lies.

Away out yonder I see a star,-

Silvery star with a tinkling song;

To the soft dew falling I hear it calling-

Calling and tinkling the night along.

In through the window a moonbeam comes,-

Little gold moonbeam with misty wings;

All silently creeping, it asks: "Is he sleeping-

Sleeping and dreaming while mother sings?"

Up from the sea there floats the sob

Of the waves that are breaking upon the shore,

As though they were groaning in anguish, and moan-

ing-

Bemoaning the ship that shall come no more.

But sleep, little pigeon, and fold your wings,-

Little blue pigeon with mournful eyes;

Am I not singing? - see, I am swinging-

Swinging the nest where my darling lies.

The Gift

       I want to give you something child, for we are drifting in the stream of the world. Our lives will be carried apart, and our love forgotten. But I am not so foolish as to hope that I could buy your heart with gifts. Young is your live, your path long, and you drink the love we bring you at one draught and turn and run away from us. You have your play and your playmates. What harm is there if you have no time or thought for us?

       We, indeed, have leisure enough in old age to count the days that are past, to cherish in our hearts what our hands have lost forever.

       The river runs swift with a song, breaking through all barriers. But the mountain stays and remembers, and follows her with his love. by Rabindranath Tagore.

Widow and Child by Alfred Tennyson

 Widow and Child 

by Alfred Tennyson

Home they brought her warrior dead;

She nor swooned, nor uttered cry;

All her maidens, watching, said,

"She must weep or she will die."

Then they praised him soft and low,

Called him worthy to be loved,

Truest friend and noblest foe;

Yet she neither spoke nor moved.

Stole a maiden from her place,

Lightly to the warrior stept,

Took a face-cloth from the face,

Yet she neither moved nor wept.

Rose a nurse of ninety years,

Set his child upon her knee-

Like summer tempest came her tears-

"Sweet my child, I live for thee."

"A sad but very beautiful lullaby. After the execution of the Clan Chief MacGregor of Glenstrae in 1570, his widow composed and sang this lullaby lament to her child."

Mother's Day Bill In Congress

From Congressional Record, May, 1914

       Whereas the service rendered the United States by the American mother is the greatest source of the country's strength and inspiration; and

       Whereas we honor ourselves and the mothers of America when we do anything to give emphasis to the home as the fountain head of the State; and

       Whereas the American mother is doing so much for the home, for moral uplift, and religion, hence so much for good government and humanity; Therefore be it 

       Resolved, etc. That the President of the United States is hereby authorized and requested to issue a proclamation calling upon the Government officials to display the United States flag on all Government buildings, and the people of the United States to display the flag at their homes or other suitable places on the second Sunday in May, as a public expression of our love and reverence for the mothers of our country.

       Section 2. That the second Sunday in May shall hereafter be designated and known as Mother's Day, and it shall be the duty of the President to request its observance as provided for in this resolution.

       The joint resolution was reported to the Senate as amended and the amendment concurred in.

       The amendment was ordered to be engrossed and the joint resolution to be read a third time.

       The joint resolution was read a third time and passed.

       The preamble was agreed to.

       The title was amended to read: "A joint resolution designating the second Sunday in May as Mother's Day and for other purposes."

       A message announced the House agrees with the amendment in joint resolution designating the second Sunday in May as Mother's Day, and for other purposes.

       H. J. Res 263. Joint resolution designating the second Sunday in May as Mothers' Day, and for other purposes.

       Approved and signed by the President. May 8th, 1914.

Born - A Daughter

"A Daughter!

Well, what brought her?"
Kitty asks. "How came she here? "
Half with joy and half with fear,
Kitty is our eldest child -
Eight years old, and rather wild -
Wild in manner, but in mind
Wishing all things well defined.

''Last night I did not see her, father,
Or I'm sure I had much rather
Stayed at home, as still as a mouse.
Than played all day at grandma's house.
She is so pretty, and so tiny -
And what makes her face so shiny?
Will it always be like that?
Will she swell up, plump and fat,
Like my little doll? or tall.
Like my wax one? tell me all
About her, papa dear,
For I do so love to hear
Where she came from, and who brought her,
Yours and mamma's brand-new daughter."

A daughter! another daughter!
And the question is, "What brought her?"
Spence, our boy, but three years old,
Says the nurse did, and is bold 

In defiance of them both,
Since to yield his place he's loth;
And, pouting, feels his nose's point.
When I declare 'tis out of joint.

But though the childish explanation
Be food enough for child's vexation.
We older folks must better find
To feed the hunger of the mind;
To us, of larger issues preaching,
This link of life eternal, reaching
From earth to heaven, this new-born soul
Come, fresh from whence forever roll
It's countless years through yonder heaven,
Has deeper cause for thinking given.

A daughter!
Whatever else - she comes to bring
A blessing in her life's young spring.
" No matter, darling - she is here -
Our daughter, sister, baby dear!
Open your hearts, and let her enter,
Open them wide, for God hath sent her."

Creation's Constant Love

       A broader view of life, a grander meaning of the word, is growing in the understanding of mankind. There is a growing confidence that a great love like a mother's love pervades the Universe. This perfect love that casts out fear is bringing us a definition of life large enough to include death as merely one of life's incidents, and thus the fear of death as a moving factor in the minds of men is passing away. Mother-love, love like a mother's, has for ages bridged the river of death for the heart, till now the understanding is following where the heart has led.

       All that modern science and learning is doing to dispel the mists of ignorance (where fear hides) is adding strength to that growing confidence in which love may breathe, the true, unselfish love, the mother-love that knows no fear. The following lines of deep meaning are from the pen of Leopold Schaffer:

All that God owns he constantly is healing.

Quietly, gently, softly, but most surely;

He helps the lowliest herb with wounded stalk

To rise again. See! from the heavens fly down,

All gentle powers to cure the blinded lamb.

Deep in the treasure-house of wealthy nature

A ready instinct wakes and moves

To clothe the naked sparrow in the nest.

Or trim the plumage of an aged raven.

Yea, in the slow decaying of a rose

God works as well as in the unfolding bud:

He works with gentleness unspeakable

In death itself‚ a thousand times more careful,

Even as the mother by her sick child watching.

The Prophecy of Mother-Love

       As in the blade of grass and in the smallest herb, the first years of our globe gave signs of the coming  tree; as in the first drops of rain there was the promise of a coming ocean; as in the little garden of Eden there lay the prophecy of future homes, so the earliest instincts and affections of animal life were advance heralds of a profound devotion destined to appear in the form of a mother's love. Each wild beast which to the death would defend its young, each bird that screamed and fluttered when an enemy approached its nest, said in distinct accents that Nature was preparing the way for that sublime sentiment‚ human love. No wonder, then, that when writers, sacred or profane, have desired to convey some adequate notion of the love of God for His universe, they have always asked us to look upon a mother and her child. In that love we find all the heights and depths of sentiment, and when we have compared God to a loving mother, we can say no more‚ our richest emblem is then exhausted. By Professor Swing.