International Day of Friendship

The Origins of International Friendship Day

The idea of Friendship Day may have initially come from Joyce Hall in 1930, the founder of Hallmark Cards, who wanted celebrations to occur on August 2 each year. However, the holiday didn’t last long in the United States as many people thought it was a gimmick for selling greeting cards. Which probably was true.
This holiday however may be unrelated because of how universal the concept of friendship is and also the fact that we have very little reliable documentation of what happened way back before we had the world wide web to share all our news and rumors alike.

In 1958 Dr. Ramon Artemio Bracho and his friends founded the World Friendship Crusade and proposed International Friendship Day on July 30 to help promote the magic of friendship and fellowship among all humans, regardless of race, color or religion.

Fast forward a few decades and the UN decides this is an idea worth spreading worldwide.
To honor Friendship Day Nane Annan named Winnie the Pooh the world’s Ambassador of Friendship at the United Nations in 1998. 

Then finally in 2011 the United Nations, the ultimate hall monitor of the world, decided friendship was important enough to deserve an official global shout-out.
Each year on International Friendship Day the UN encourages governments, international organizations and civil society groups to hold events, activities and initiatives around the themes of international community,communication among different countries, solidarity, mutual understanding and reconciliation.