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He's Speaking To Your Children. Would You Freak Out If They Listened?
I can't tell whether he's joking with some of these, but overall there's some great things to take away from this (like, don't try to be Jay-Z).
12.16.13
Images via MyHeritage
Sonora Smart Dodd and a painting of her father, William Jackson Smart
Father's Day falls on Sunday, June 15 this year. The holiday will see families gathered together to honor and celebrate father figures in all forms, from grandfathers to stepdads and 'chosen' dads. And the origin of Father's Day has a deep connection to American history and single dads.
It's a story that begins in Spokane, Washington in 1909, with a young woman named Sonora Smart Dodd. It's an important tale in American history that was uncovered by the researcher Naama Lanski and her team at MyHeritage.com (an online genealogy platform)—who reached out to Sonora’s great-granddaughter and the last living direct heir, Betsy Roddy—as well as researched historical documents and records from the time period.
Dodd was listening to a church sermon on Mother's Day when it struck her: "Why isn’t there a Father’s Day?" Her father, a Civil War veteran named William Jackson Smart, deserved to be honored.
Photo of Sonora Smart Dodd.Courtesy of MyHeritage
Betsy Roddy tells Upworthy that after Sonora's mother's death in 1898 (when she was just 16), William Jackson Smart raised her and her five younger brothers on his own—something that bucked cultural tradition at the time.
"Rather than pass his children off to relatives, he chose to keep them at home and serve as mother and father for 6 young children," she says.
After Sonora approached her pastor about establishing a Father's Day, her vision came to fruition in 1910 when the inaugural Father's Day was held.
Drawing of William Jackson Smart.Courtesy of MyHeritage
"It took a year, but she petitioned the ministerial alliance and YWCA in Spokane," Roddy tells Upworthy. "It was a simple celebration city-wide, and Father's Day was proclaimed by the local government. They handed out red and white roses—red to living fathers and white for fathers who had passed. It became official symbol of Father's Day."
The holiday quickly went nationwide, but it would be another 60+ years until it was recognized by the United States federal government. Dodd petitioned and lobbied for Father's Day to become a national holiday.
"She worked pretty tirelessly to push the concept forward," adds Roddy.
Finally, in 1972 under President Richard Nixon, the third Sunday in June was officially proclaimed Father's Day and signed into law. Dodd was 90 years old, alive and well and able to see her tireless work pay off.
Roddy was able to develop a relationship with her great-grandmother before she passed away at 96.
"My great-grandmothers stuck to the idea and vision of this being a national holiday. She fearlessly took on something much bigger than herself, before women had the right to vote," says Roddy. "It's easy to lose sight of that in context of today's world. She took on something women didn't do that was incredibly courageous. It's also a story of a woman's courage. To hold fast to an idea and see it through is a lesson for all of us. It's not just my great-grandma's legacy, it's an American story and legacy."
Adds Lanski, " At a time when parenthood was seen almost exclusively through a maternal lens, she championed the vital role of fathers and fatherhood - shaped by her own experience being raised by a dedicated and proud single father."
via Public Domain
Photos from the 1800s were so serious.
If you've ever perused photographs from the 19th and early 20th century, you've likely noticed how serious everyone looked. If there's a hint of a smile at all, it's oh-so-slight, but more often than not, our ancestors looked like they were sitting for a sepia-toned mug shot or being held for ransom or something. Why didn't people smile in photographs? Was life just so hard back then that nobody smiled? Were dour, sour expressions just the norm?
Most often, people's serious faces in old photographs are blamed on the long exposure time of early cameras, and that's true. Taking a photo was not an instant event like it is now; people had to sit still for many minutes in the 1800s to have their photo taken.
Ever try holding a smile for only one full minute? It's surprisingly difficult and very quickly becomes unnatural. A smile is a quick reaction, not a constant state of expression. Even people we think of as "smiley" aren't toting around full-toothed smiles for minutes on end. When you had to be still for several minutes to get your photo taken, there was just no way you were going to hold a smile for that long.
But there are other reasons besides long exposure times that people didn't smile in early photographs.
"Mona Lisa" by Leonardo da Vinci, painted in 1503Public domain
The non-smiling precedent had already been set by centuries of painted portraits
The long exposure times for early photos may have contributed to serious facial expressions, but so did the painted portraits that came before them. Look at all of the portraits of famous people throughout history prior to cameras. Sitting to be painted took hours, so smiling was out of the question. Other than the smallest of lip curls like the Mona Lisa, people didn't smile for painted portraits, so why would people suddenly think it normal to flash their pearly whites (which were not at all pearly white back then) for a photographed one? It simply wasn't how it was done.
A smirk? Sometimes. A full-on smile? Practically never.
Algerian immigrant to the United States. Photographed on Ellis Island by Augustus F. Sherman.via William Williams/Wikimedia Commons
Smiling usually indicated that you were a fool or a drunkard
Our perceptions of smiling have changed dramatically since the 1800s. In explaining why smiling was considered taboo in portraits and early photos, art historian Nicholas Jeeves wrote in Public Domain Review:
"Smiling also has a large number of discrete cultural and historical significances, few of them in line with our modern perceptions of it being a physical signal of warmth, enjoyment, or indeed of happiness. By the 17th century in Europe it was a well-established fact that the only people who smiled broadly, in life and in art, were the poor, the lewd, the drunk, the innocent, and the entertainment […] Showing the teeth was for the upper classes a more-or-less formal breach of etiquette."
"Malle Babbe" by Frans Hals, sometime between 1640 and 1646Public domain
In other words, to the Western sensibility, smiling was seen as undignified. If a painter did put a smile on the subject of a portrait, it was a notable departure from the norm, a deliberate stylistic choice that conveyed something about the artist or the subject.
Even the artists who attempted it had less-than-ideal results. It turns out that smiling is such a lively, fleeting expression that the artistically static nature of painted portraits didn't lend itself well to showcasing it. Paintings that did have subjects smiling made them look weird or disturbing or drunk. Simply put, painting a genuine, natural smile didn't work well in portraits of old.
As a result, the perception that smiling was an indication of lewdness or impropriety stuck for quite a while, even after Kodak created snapshot cameras that didn't have the long exposure time problem. Even happy occasions had people nary a hint of joy in the photographs that documented them.
Another reason why people didn't smile in old photos is that dental hygiene wasn't the same as it is today, and people may have been self-conscious about their teeth. “People had lousy teeth, if they had teeth at all, which militated against opening your mouth in social settings,” Angus Trumble, the director of the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra, Australia, and author of A Brief History of the Smile, said, according to Time.
Even wedding party photos didn't appear to be joyful occasions.Wikimedia Commons
Then along came movies, which may have changed the whole picture
So how did we end up coming around to grinning ear to ear for photos? Interestingly enough, it may have been the advent of motion pictures that pushed us towards smiling being the norm.
Photos could have captured people's natural smiles earlier—we had the technology for taking instant photos—but culturally, smiling wasn't widely favored for photos until the 1920s. One theory about that timing is that the explosion of movies enabled us to see emotions of all kinds playing out on screen, documenting the fleeting expressions that portraits had failed to capture. Culturally, it became normalized to capture, display and see all kind of emotions on people's faces. As we got more used to that, photo portraits began portraying people in a range of expression rather than trying to create a neutral image of a person's face.
Changing our own perceptions of old photo portraits to view them as neutral rather than grumpy or serious can help us remember that people back then were not a bunch of sourpusses, but people who experienced as wide a range of emotion as we do, including joy and mirth. Unfortunately, we just rarely get to see them in that state before the 1920s.
This article originally appeared last year.
via Bonnie/Wikimedia Commons, Alan Gastelum/Wikimedia Commons, Underbelly Limited/Wikimedia Commons
Comedians George Carlin, Jim Gaffigan and Joan Rivers
Laughter really is the best medicine, and there are a lot of ways to get your daily dose. You can rewatch an old funny movie that's been proven to get the job done, listen to a hilarious podcast, or goof around with friends. Maybe the most efficient way to really get yourself rolling, though, is to take in some stand-up comedy.
And while it feels like the true heyday of stand-up is over — the days of George Carlin and Richard Pryror — the truth is that stand-up is more popular than ever. That's thanks, in part, to Netflix, which drives millions of viewers to featured comedy acts, who then go on to sell out huge theaters for their shows.
Comedy is powerful, necessary, and relevant. In fact, Oscar Wilde once said, "If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you."
A Reddit user recently posed a great question on the AskReddit subforum: “What is a quote from a comedian you'll never forget?”
The post quickly went viral, receiving over 10,700 responses on the first day. Of the countless comedians mentioned in the thread, Norm Macdonald appears to be the most quotable.
Sadly, Macdonald died of cancer in 2021, but he was famous for his outlandish musings, delivered in a dry, deliberate tone. Macdonald is best known as a stand-up comedian, but he was also memorable on television as a cast member on "Saturday Night Live" from 1993 to 1997 and on his sitcom, “The Norm Show.” Two other deceased funnymen were often quoted in the discussion, Mitch Hedberg and George Carlin.
Hedberg’s comedy was based on short, memorable one-liners filled with absurdity. He passed away in 2005 from a drug overdose. George Carlin is often listed among the greatest stand-up comedians of all time and was a voice of the counterculture in the ‘60s and ‘70s. Later in life, his comedy evolved into a nihilistic criticism of American life that, for many, is still relevant today.
“It's called 'the American Dream' 'cause you have to be asleep to believe it,” Carlin said.
George Carlin is considered by many to be the GOATGiphy
Here are 23 of the funniest and most poignant quotes from a comedian shared by users on the AskReddit forum.
1.
"Every time you clog a toilet, you exceeded someone’s expectations." — Unknown
2.
"Everybody thinks they're a comedian. Especially in my line of work." — Norm Macdonald
This came from Macdonald's memoir, "Based on a True Story," a must-read for Norm fans. My favorite thing about this line is that it was a sort of random throwaway, almost an afterthought, as he was expressing disdain for a doctor who told a joke and got a big laugh from everyone else in the room.
And that doctor's joke? It was Macdonald's own moth story.
RIP Norm MacdonaldGiphy
3.
“I’m not an adventurous person. I’ve only ever used one side of a cheese grater.” — James Acaster
4.
“I’ve started cooking with wine. That sounds so fancy, cooking with wine. What I do is I get drunk and I make rice. I tell my friends ‘come over, I’m cooking with wine.’ They come over, I’m drunk, and there’s rice everywhere.” — Kevin Nealon
5.
"What is it like to have four kids? Imagine you are drowning, and then someone hands you a baby." — Jim Gaffigan
Jim Gaffigan, the funniest lazy dad you know.Giphy
6.
"I find a duck's opinion of me is very much influenced by whether or not I have bread." — Mitch Hedberg
7.
“Cocaine is God's way of saying you make too much money." — Robin Williams
8.
"I don't like country music, but I don't mean to denigrate those who do. And for the people who like country music, denigrate means 'put down'." — Bob Newhart
9.
“People say someone lost their battle with cancer. But if someone dies from cancer, the cancer dies too. I’d call that a draw.” — Norm MacDonald
10.
"You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, which is just long enough to be president of the United States." — Spike Milligan
11.
"When you are on fire, and running down the street, people will get out of your way." — Richard Pryor
Richard Pryor: a legend.Giphy
12.
"I was walking down the street the other day and these construction workers were working on the roof hammering away. One of them told me I was a paranoid lunatic...in morse code." — Emo Phillips
13.
"Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read." — Groucho Marx
14.
"I didn't want to be Drunk in Public. I wanted to be drunk in a bar. They THREW me into public." — Ron White
15.
"I know I'm getting older, my last birthday cake looked like a prairie fire!" — Rodney Dangerfield
Rodney Dangerfield don't get no respect.Giphy
16.
"Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that." — George Carlin
17.
"When you got a career there ain't enough time in the world...when you got a job there's too much time." — Chris Rock
18.
"She had enough plastic surgery so that when she crossed her legs, her mouth snapped open." — Joan Rivers
19.
"Nationalism does nothing but teach you to hate people you never met, and to take pride in accomplishments you had no part in." — Doug Stanhope
20.
"I'm impulsive, but I'm also quite indecisive. I don't know what I want, but I know that I want it now." - Dylan Moran
21.
“So, I sit at the hotel at night and I think of something that’s funny. Or, If the pen is too far away, I have to convince myself that what I thought of wasn’t funny.” - Mitch Hedberg
22.
"When you are dead, you do not know you are dead. It's only painful & difficult for others. The same applies when you are stupid." - Ricky Gervais
Ricky Gervais dances in 'The Office'Giphy
23.
"The world is like a ride in an amusement park, and when you choose to go on it you think it's real because that's how powerful our minds are. The ride goes up and down, around and around, it has thrills and chills, and it's very brightly colored, and it's very loud, and it's fun for a while.
Many people have been on the ride a long time, and they begin to wonder, 'Hey, is this real, or is this just a ride?' And other people have remembered, and they come back to us and say, 'Hey, don't worry; don't be afraid, ever, because this is just a ride.'
And we … kill those people.
'Shut him up! I've got a lot invested in this ride, shut him up! Look at my furrows of worry, look at my big bank account, and my family. This has to be real.'
It's just a ride. But we always kill the good guys who try and tell us that, you ever notice that? And let the demons run amok … But it doesn't matter, because it's just a ride.
And we can change it any time we want. It's only a choice. No effort, no work, no job, no savings of money. Just a simple choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your doors, buy guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love instead see all of us as one.
Here's what we can do to change the world, right now, to a better ride. Take all that money we spend on weapons and defenses each year and instead spend it feeding and clothing and educating the poor of the world, which it would pay for many times over, not one human being excluded, and we could explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace." — Bill Hicks
This article originally appeared two years ago. It has been updated.
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