Sadie Hawkins Day is reputed to be the only holiday inspired by a comic strip. In the Li’l Abner strip over 80 years ago, the character Sadie Hawkins could not get a husband, so her father, the town mayor arranged a foot race in which all of the eligible bachelors ran ahead of the young (and not so young) ladies who desired husbands. Any man caught by a woman was legally required to marry her.
The idea of empowering females to take the initiative in pursuing romantic relationships caught on, and during the four subsequent decades the Abner strip ran, all manner of Sadie Hawkins events were held, always on November 13th. The Sadie Hawkins Dance was one popular form for the celebration in which the ladies were expected to ask a gentlemen for a date to the dance.
Of course cultures and customs have evolved over the last eight decades so we don’t hear a lot about Sadie Hawkins these days. But it is interesting to think about possibilities in the context of today.
What do you think should be done with Sadie Hawkins Day? Celebrate the original? Evolve it into something more suitable? Scrap it?
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