Fudge, it's Father's Day on Sunday

In most years, the big observance on June 16 might be Bloomsday, so named because because everything that James Joyce crammed into his novel Ulysses takes place on a single day (June 16, 1904) and the protagonist of the novel is named Leopold Bloom.

But this year, Bloomsday and even Fudge Day must take a back seat behind Father's Day (unless, we suppose, your father is a serious Joyce devotee or if he really likes fudge).

The U.S. Census Bureau, of all agencies, has a lot to say about the history of Father's Day: "The idea of Father's Day was conceived slightly more than a century ago by Sonora Dodd of Spokane, Wash., while she listened to a Mother's Day sermon in 1909. Dodd wanted a special day to honor her father, William Smart, a widowed Civil War veteran who was left to raise his six children on a farm. A day in June was chosen for the first Father's Day celebration June 17, 1910, proclaimed by Spokane's mayor because it was the month of Smart's birth. The first presidential proclamation honoring fathers was issued in 1966 when President Lyndon Johnson designated the third Sunday in June as Father's Day. Father's Day has been celebrated annually since 1972 when President Richard Nixon signed the public law that made it permanent." (And, if you follow that link, you'll find more dad-centric statistics you can toss around at tomorrow's barbecue.)

We put up a picture of ties on this post because it used to be traditional to get Pop a new necktie on Father's Day. But in today's more casual world, with neckties becoming optional even for politicians on the stump, does anyone still buy Dad ties?