The time was picked as a number play on Avogadro’s Number (6.02 x 1023). And that is why Mole Day is not a whole day, but only and precisely from 06:02 to 18:02.
Mole Day was first mentioned in an article in ‘The Science Teacher’ in 1980-something. Inspired by this article, high school chemistry teacher Maurice Oehler, from Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, founded the National Mole Day Foundation (NMDF) on May 15, 1991 to promote that chemistry is fun!
The date is inspired by the Avogadro number for calculating the number of particles in one mole of any substance. A mole is a measuring unit used in chemistry to measure very small units of substance. Because numbers and chemistry can be boring when only used for calculations, making fun of those numbers makes them easier to remember and an extra reason to make class more fun.
