Sadie Hawkins Day: Who was the character and how do people celebrate the folk holiday?
A cartoon strip that first appeared in 1937 started a celebration designed to reverse traditional dating gender roles, Sadie Hawkins Day.
It’s that time of the year when portions of the United States celebrate Sadie Hawkins Day, a day when women take the lead in asking their crush out on a date or to tie the knot. Typically, it is celebrated on 13 November, but other events honor the day on which the comic strip that originated the quirky holiday was first published.
The idea is that it’s a day of empowerment for women by turning ideas about traditional gender roles in dating on their head. However, others see its origin as quiet insulting.
The origins of Sadie Hawkins Day
Cartoonist Al Capp publish his first iteration of the Sadie Hawkins story on 15 November, 1937, in the daily comic strip “Li’l Abner’, which told stories about the residents of fictional Dogpatch, Kentucky. In the particular storyline that led to the creation of Sadie Hawkins Day, the well-to-do father of the day’s namesake, Mayor Hekzebiah Hawkins, was concerned that his 35-year-old daughter Sadie still hadn’t married.
Furthermore, he saw her prospects of fetching a husband as very limited due to her being the “homeliest gal in all them hills.” So, he set up a race with all the bachelors in town, in which the one that his daughter Sadie caught would be forced to marry her, with financial compensation.
Sadie Hawkins was the daughter of Dogpatch Mayor Hekzebiah Hawkins, who declared "Sadie Hawkins Day." A foot race was decreed with Sadie pursuing the town's eligible bachelors. If she caught one of them, he would be forced to marry her. Art by Frank Frazetta. pic.twitter.com/LkvCHHX97g
— DrPopCulture (@DrPopCultureUSA) January 26, 2025
The concept caught on almost right away, with the first event where girls asked the boys to the dance being organized the following year. In 1939, over 200 colleges held Sadie Hawkins dances according to a report in Life magazine.
The tradition spread and events took place at colleges as well as high schools across the nation. It also became a day in general for women to make the first move asking a boy out, or even to propose marriage.
Some, however, take issue with the comic strip’s storyline that was the genesis of the holiday, mainly that a woman in her mid-thirties is somehow unweddable or that she even has to get married.
Alternate dates for Sadie Hawkins Day
After the popularity of the holiday, Capp began publishing a new Sadie Hawkin story each year in November. Capp eventually established the 26 November as the official date, but unfortunately that often conflicts with Thanksgiving.
Some use 15 November as the official date for the holiday, the date on which the original Sadie Hawkins comic strip storyline was published.
However, the “official” date is given as the 13th. But since the 13th can fall on any day of the week, some celebrate Sadie Hawkins Day on the first Saturday in November.
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