- [Narrator] "The greatestgift I ever had came from God.

"I call him Dad."

In those few words, theunknown author captured a truth

poets, writers, philosophers

and preachers have beenwriting about for centuries.

Good fathers are indispensable in life,

and deeply missed when they're gone.

In the words of Billy Graham,

"A good father is one of

"the most unsung, unpraised, unnoticed,

"and yet one of the mostvaluable assets in our society."

It's likely those verythoughts inspired Sonora Dodd,

a young woman who imagineda National Father's Day

in honor of her father,William Jackson Smart,

a Civil War veteran and father of 12.

William suffered personal pain and loss,

yet still managed to showSonora and her siblings

the meaning of unconditional,sacrificial love,

expecting nothing in return.

An 83-year-old Sonorasaid in a 1965 interview.

- [Sonora] My own fathernever accepted Father's Day

as personal to himself,

but to all fathers, worthy fathers.

- [Narrator] Today, BetsyRoddy passes down their story.

She's Sonora's great granddaughter,

and William Smart's greatgreat granddaughter,

and says much of what she knows

she heard from Sonora herself.

- I think she views himas a dedicated father.

Very fact that he went against the norm.

The norm would have beenupon his wife's passing

that the young childrenwould have been farmed out

to relatives to raise.

He didn't do that.

Never considered doing it.

He was clearly dedicated to family.

It simply wasn't arequirement in those days,

in that era, for widowers totake on the role that he did,

but he did.

- [Narrator] William's story as a father

begins when he took up farming

after serving in the UnionArmy in the Civil War.

At war's end in Arkansas,

the now 22-year-oldUnion Artillery Sergeant

married Elizabeth and had three children.

13 years later his wife died,

leaving him to raise his children alone.

He went on to marry Ellen,

a widow with three children of her own.

Their first child together was Sonora,

followed by five boys.

Now there were 12.

- In fact they all got along,

and they called themselves steps, halves

and sibs. (laughing)

It was the joke in the family.

- [Narrator] Later they all moved westward

to a soldier's homesteadin Eastern Washington,

but in 1898, 18 years after they married,

Ellen died in childbirth.

With his six youngest children,

Sonora and her five brothers still home,

he again put his own pain aside

to be there for them.

- She recalls a story on thenight of her mother's funeral

that her youngest brotherran out into the night

crying and looking for his mom,

and her father followed him out there,

brought him in, sat by the fire,

and rocked him to sleep and sang to him.

And as she recounts, in that moment

her father became father and mother

to their entire really large family.

That sense of strength,caring and protection

would carry Sonora'sfamily through many good

and bad times for years to come.

Then, in 1909, Sonora, now a27-year-old wife and mother

living in Spokane, Washington,

attended to a Mother's Day service

that actually brought her father to mind.

- She went and talked toher minister afterwards,

she said "I love whatyou said about mothers

"and Mother's Day, but what about fathers?

"When do they get their time in the sun?"

- [Narrator] After carefulconsideration and thought,

Sonora called on churches to establish

a National Father's Day.

Within a year she had convinced church

and government leaders,

including the Washington State governor,

to set aside every third Sunday of June

to celebrate Fathers.

On June 19, 1910, Presbyterianand Methodist churches

throughout Washington observedthe first Father's Day.

Sonora of course wentto church that morning,

and afterwards she spent her day

delivering Father's Daygifts to elderly shut ins.

By the following year Father's Day

was being observed around the world.

And Sonora would have nine more years

to celebrate with her father,

before his death in 1919.

Still, it wasn't until1966, when Sonora was 84,

that President Lyndon Johnsonissued an executive order

designating the third Sundayin June as Father's Day.

Six years later, in 1972,

it would be signed intolaw by Richard Nixon,

calling on U.S. citizens to offer public

and private expressions of such day

with the abiding love and gratitude

which they bear for their fathers.

Shortly after, on her 90th birthday,

Sonora received a telegramfrom President Nixon

thanking her for this great tradition,

a day we remember the deniable need

for good fathers in our families,

communities and societies.

- It was extremely gratifying to her.

Imagine she's been working on this

since 1910 (laughing),

so 62 years later,

it really, it becomes real,

in a very codified sense of the word.

And because I think it signaledthe level of importance

that she always had for this legacy,

and not just because of her own father,

but for fathers everywhere.

She was really dedicated to the idea

of we need to celebrate them,

they do a really amazing thing.