151 Fun Facts About Father's Day

Taiwan marks Father's Day on which date, chosen because it sounds like 'bàba', the Mandarin word for dad?

8 August: 'eight' is 'bā' in Mandarin, so the eighth day of the eighth month reads 'bā bā', almost the same as 'bàba', and Taiwanese fathers get their day on a pun.

Which actor gave his voice to two of cinema's most famous fathers, Darth Vader and Mufasa?

James Earl Jones stuttered so badly as a boy that he hardly spoke for years, until a high-school teacher got him to recite a poem to the class and the famous bass voice found its footing.

Sonora Smart Dodd founded Father's Day to honour her father, a veteran of which war?

Civil War: William Jackson Smart was widowed in 1898 when his wife died in childbirth, and Sonora, at 16 the eldest child and only girl, helped him bring up the boys.

Which flower did people in Spokane wear on the first Father's Day in 1910?

The rose: boys from the Spokane YMCA wore fresh-cut roses in their lapels, red for a living father and white for one who had died. The carnation was already the emblem of Mother's Day.

Which president, in the election year 1972, signed the law that made Father's Day a permanent US national holiday?

Richard Nixon signed the law on April 24, 1972, 62 years after Spokane's first celebration. Lyndon B. Johnson's 1966 proclamation had covered that year alone, so the day had stayed unofficial.

Which American river has long been nicknamed the 'Father of Waters'?

The Mississippi: when the fall of Vicksburg in 1863 gave the Union the whole river, President Lincoln wrote that 'the Father of Waters again goes unvexed to the sea'.

In Spain, Portugal and Italy, Father's Day is held on 19 March — the feast day honouring which figure?

These Catholic countries attach Father's Day to 19 March, the feast of Saint Joseph, husband of Mary. Italians call it Festa del papà and the Portuguese Dia do Pai.

In Australia and New Zealand, Father's Day is celebrated on which day?

The first Sunday in September is the first Sunday of the southern spring, so Australian and New Zealand fathers are honoured as winter ends rather than in June, which is midwinter there.

In Germany, Father's Day (Vatertag) is observed on which Christian feast, always a Thursday?

German Vatertag shares its date with Ascension Day, a public holiday. A common custom is for groups of men to make a hiking trip pulling a Bollerwagen handcart loaded with beer, wine and regional food.

Thailand's National Father's Day is 5 December, the birthday of which king, who reigned from 1946 until his death in 2016?

King Bhumibol Adulyadej, Rama IX, reigned for 70 years, and Thailand kept 5 December as Father's Day and a public holiday after his death rather than moving it to his son's birthday.

Which country celebrates Father's Day, known there as 'Dia dos Pais', on the second Sunday of August?

Brazil: publicist Sylvio Bhering of the newspaper O Globo launched the day in 1953 on the feast of Saint Joachim, Mary's father, to give shops a lift between Mother's Day and Christmas.

Nepal honours fathers on Kushe Aunsi, a day named for which lunar phase?

Aunsi is the new moon day in the Hindu lunar calendar, so Kushe Aunsi shifts around late August or early September from year to year.

What is the 8 May observance on which South Koreans honour their fathers called?

Parents' Day began in 1956 as Mother's Day and was renamed in 1973 so that fathers were honoured too; children still pin carnations on both parents.

Which president gave Father's Day his public backing in 1916, 56 years before it became a national holiday?

Woodrow Wilson had made Mother's Day a national holiday in 1914, yet his support for Father's Day two years later produced no law, and fathers waited until 1972 for the same honour.

Grace Golden Clayton proposed a day to honour fathers in 1908 after which disaster killed more than 360 people?

The Monongah mine explosion in West Virginia was America's worst mining disaster; Clayton's church held a service for the lost fathers in July 1908, but it was a one-off that started no annual tradition.

The English settlers remembered as the Pilgrim Fathers crossed the Atlantic in 1620 aboard which ship?

The Mayflower sailed alone because its companion, the Speedwell, leaked so badly that both ships turned back, and the delay pushed the crossing into the autumn storm season.

Why was the first Father's Day in 1910 held two weeks later than its founder wanted?

Pastors needed sermon time: Sonora Smart Dodd asked for 5 June, her father's birthday, but Spokane's ministers said they could not prepare by then and chose the third Sunday of the month, 19 June.

Which physicist is often called the 'father of the atomic bomb'?

Robert Oppenheimer led the Los Alamos laboratory that built the bomb, then argued against the far more powerful hydrogen bomb and was stripped of his security clearance in 1954.

Which ancient Greek is traditionally called the 'Father of Medicine'?

Hippocrates of Kos gave his name to the oath doctors still swear, although scholars think the oath was written after his death and that others wrote most of the works credited to him.

Which guitarist wrote the 1998 song 'My Father's Eyes' about the father he never met?

Eric Clapton was raised by his grandparents, believing they were his mother and father, and never met his real father; he wrote that he glimpsed the man at last in the eyes of his own young son, Conor.

Whose experiments with pea plants earned him the title 'father of genetics'?

Gregor Mendel, an Augustinian friar, saw his pea results ignored in his lifetime; other botanists rediscovered his laws of inheritance around 1900, sixteen years after he died.

Which king was the father of Alexander the Great?

Philip II made Macedon the leading power in Greece and was planning to invade Persia when he was assassinated in 336 BC, leaving both the army and the plan to his son.

In 1924 which president urged the states to observe Father's Day but left it short of an official holiday?

Calvin Coolidge backed the day in 1924 but issued no national proclamation, and a Congress wary of creating another commercial holiday left Father's Day unofficial for decades more.

Which social reformer proposed a citywide Father's Day for Chicago in 1911, a year after Spokane's?

Jane Addams, founder of Chicago's Hull House, floated the idea in 1911, but it was a 1913 bill in Congress that first tried to make Father's Day national, and it failed.

Who was the father of Queen Elizabeth II?

George VI was never meant to reign: he became king in 1936 only because his elder brother Edward VIII abdicated, which put his ten-year-old daughter Elizabeth next in line.

When does the Eastern Orthodox Church keep the feast of the Forefathers?

Two Sundays before Nativity: the Sunday of the Holy Forefathers falls between 11 and 17 December and commemorates the ancestors of Christ; the Sunday of the Holy Fathers follows a week later.

South Sudan has marked Father's Day since 2012 on which day?

The last Monday of August: South Sudan, independent from July 2011, held its first Father's Day on that day in August 2012.

Which reggae star was the father of musicians Ziggy, Stephen and Damian?

Bob Marley had eleven children, and after his death in 1981 his eldest son Ziggy carried the name on by leading the family band, the Melody Makers.

Which king was the father of Queen Elizabeth I?

Henry VIII had Elizabeth's mother, Anne Boleyn, beheaded and the girl declared illegitimate before restoring her to the succession; she went on to reign for 44 years.

The necktie traces back to mercenaries from which country serving France in the Thirty Years' War?

Croatia: Parisians took to the knotted neckcloths of Croatian mercenaries in the 1630s, and 'cravate', the French word for a necktie, is simply the word for a Croat.

Physicists at which university's Cavendish Laboratory showed in 1999 that there are exactly 85 ways to tie a necktie?

Cambridge: Thomas Fink and Yong Mao treated each knot as a random walk, published the method in the journal Nature and then turned it into the book The 85 Ways to Tie a Tie.

International Necktie Day is celebrated on which date in the country where the cravat originated?

October 18: Croatia's parliament declared 18 October Cravat Day in 2008, and cities including Dublin, Como and Tokyo mark it as International Necktie Day.

Which actor is the father of Angelina Jolie?

Jon Voight and his daughter were at odds for years, and in 2002 she went to court to drop his surname and make her middle name, Jolie, her legal last name.

Which pastry is traditionally eaten in Italy on Festa del papà, 19 March?

Zeppole are the traditional sweet of Saint Joseph's feast, which doubles as Italy's Father's Day because Joseph, who raised Jesus, is the patron saint of fathers.

In the cartoon Bluey, what is the name of Bluey's dad?

Bandit is an archaeologist, which for a cattle dog means he digs up bones for a living, and he throws himself into whatever game his daughters invent.

The Nordic countries moved Father's Day in 1949 to which month, partly to boost pre-Christmas trade?

November: Nordic shopkeepers set up a joint committee in 1949 to promote the day, and the new date also sat half a year from Mother's Day; only in Denmark did it fail to take hold.

Denmark's Father's Day on 5 June coincides with which national observance?

Constitution Day: when the other Nordic countries settled on a shared autumn date for Father's Day, the change never took hold in Denmark, where the day is kept on 5 June, the date its 1849 constitution was signed.

Which Baltic country's Father's Day was officially born in 2008, on the second Sunday of September?

Latvia: Tēvu diena was officially instituted in 2008 on the second Sunday of September, Soviet-era holidays having long crowded out any day for fathers.

Romania's law instituting Father's Day, passed in 2009, set it on the second Sunday of which month?

May: Law 319/2009 set Romania's Ziua Tatălui on the second Sunday of May, first celebrated on 9 May 2010, pairing it with Mother's Day on the first Sunday of May.

Which singer had a 1986 number one with 'Papa Don't Preach'?

Madonna sings as a pregnant teenager asking her father's blessing to keep the baby; family-planning groups accused her of glamorising teen pregnancy and urged radio stations not to play it.

Which soul singer's 2003 ballad 'Dance with My Father' won the Grammy for Song of the Year?

Luther Vandross wrote it with Richard Marx about his own father, who died of diabetes when Luther was eight and whom he remembered dancing with the family at home.

In which Australian bird does the father incubate the eggs alone, barely eating or drinking for eight weeks?

Emu fathers sit on the nest for about eight weeks, hardly eating or drinking and losing up to a third of their weight, while the female wanders off and may mate again.

In the Bible, which king was the father of King Solomon?

David was Solomon's father; the boy's mother was Bathsheba, whom David married after sending her husband Uriah to the front line to be killed.

Which Argentine 'Father of the Nation' inspired attempts to move Father's Day to the day he became a dad?

José de San Martín: campaigners wanted Father's Day on 24 August, the day in 1816 that his daughter Mercedes was born, making the Padre de la Patria a father himself.

In which Jane Austen novel is Mr Bennet the father of five unmarried daughters?

Pride and Prejudice turns on an entail: Mr Bennet's estate must pass to a male cousin, so his five daughters stand to lose their home when he dies unless they marry well.

In Dickens's A Christmas Carol, who is the father of Tiny Tim?

Bob Cratchit is Scrooge's underpaid clerk, and the story ends with the reformed miser raising his pay and becoming 'a second father' to Tiny Tim, who does not die after all.

Which Greek goddess was born fully grown from the head of her father, Zeus?

Athena sprang out in full armour, in Hesiod's telling, after Zeus swallowed her pregnant mother, Metis, to defeat a prophecy that a child of hers would take his throne.

Which Roman adopted his great-nephew Octavian, the future emperor Augustus, as his son and heir?

Julius Caesar named him heir in his will, so when Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC the 18-year-old took his name, his fortune and, in time, revenge on the killers.

Why do many Thais wear yellow to honour the late King on Father's Day?

The colour of his birth weekday: Thai tradition gives each day the colour of its guardian god, and the King was born on a Monday in 1927, so Monday's yellow became his colour.

Which US president fathered 15 children, more than any other?

John Tyler had eight children with his first wife, Letitia, and seven more with Julia Gardiner, whom he married while in office when she was 30 years his junior.

Paul McCartney wrote 'Hey Jude' to comfort the young son of which bandmate?

John Lennon had left his wife Cynthia for Yoko Ono, and McCartney began the song as 'Hey Jules' in the car on his way to visit her and five-year-old Julian.

Which actor played the father, Captain von Trapp, in the 1965 film The Sound of Music?

Christopher Plummer had mixed feelings about his most famous role: he called the part 'so awful and sentimental and gooey' that he had to work hard to slip any humour into it.

After 1979, Iran moved Father's Day to the birthday of which figure?

Ali ibn Abi Talib, the first Shia Imam, was born on 13 Rajab; before the revolution Iran's Father's Day had fallen on the birthday of Reza Shah, founder of the Pahlavi dynasty.

Which Founding Father is known as the 'Father of the Constitution'?

James Madison drafted the Virginia Plan that framed the 1787 Constitutional Convention and later wrote the Bill of Rights, earning the title 'Father of the Constitution'.

In Interstellar, which actor plays Cooper, the father who leaves his young daughter to fly through a wormhole?

Matthew McConaughey's Cooper visits a planet where every hour costs seven years on Earth, so his ten-year-old daughter Murph grows up without him and is played as an adult by Jessica Chastain.

Nepal's Kushe Aunsi is popularly known as the day for doing what?

Looking at father's face: Kushe Aunsi is known as Buwa ko Mukh Herne Din, the day for seeing one's father's face; children offer tika, sweets and gifts.

New Zealand's first Father's Day was observed in 1929 at St Matthew's Church in which city?

Auckland: the first recorded New Zealand Father's Day service was held at St Matthew's Church, Auckland, in 1929; a Wellington advertisement followed in 1937 and a Christchurch Salvation Army service in 1938.

Jawaharlal Nehru, his country's first prime minister, was the father of which later prime minister?

Indira Gandhi was Nehru's only child; her surname came from her husband, Feroze Gandhi, who was no relation of the Mahatma, and her son Rajiv later became prime minister as well.

Which country's Social Christian party proposed moving Father's Day to 19 March, feast of its capital's namesake saint?

Costa Rica: a Social Christian Unity deputy's 2005 bill would have moved the day to the feast of Saint Joseph, namesake of the capital, San José, but Father's Day stayed on the third Sunday of June.

Which composer was taught as a child by his father, Leopold, a violinist at the Salzburg court?

Mozart was not yet six when Leopold took him and his gifted sister Nannerl on the road as child prodigies, playing for the Bavarian court in Munich and then the imperial court in Vienna.

In 2022 Colombia moved Father's Day a week later to avoid clashing with what?

An election run-off: the merchants' federation Fenalco announced the switch so the country could focus on the presidential vote, and the date had been moved for the same reason in 2018.

Which Valencian festival burns its effigies on 19 March, Spain's Father's Day?

Las Fallas ends with the cremà, when the giant effigies burn around midnight. The custom is traced to Valencia's carpenters, who burned the wooden planks that had held their winter lamps.

In Greek myth, which king of Ithaca takes ten years to sail home from Troy to his son Telemachus?

Odysseus never wanted to go: in one telling he feigned madness at the plough to dodge the war, until Palamedes laid baby Telemachus in its path and he swerved, proving himself sane.

Which Swiss canton keeps Father's Day on 19 March, which is a public holiday there?

Ticino is Switzerland's Italian-speaking canton and follows Italy's date and its name, Festa del papà, while the rest of the country celebrates fathers months later.

Which US president's father, Joseph, was a millionaire who served as ambassador to Britain?

John F. Kennedy was the second son: Joseph Kennedy had marked out his eldest, Joe Jr., for the political career, and the family's hopes passed to John only after Joe Jr. was killed in action in 1944.

In the Netherlands, fathers traditionally get what on Father's Day morning?

Breakfast in bed: on Vaderdag Dutch fathers are meant to sleep in while the children make the meal and carry it up, usually with a homemade present.

The Seychelles celebrates Father's Day on which fixed date?

16 June: the Seychelles fixes Father's Day on 16 June rather than a movable Sunday; it is a working day, not one of the islands' public holidays.

In which animal does the male carry the fertilised eggs in a brood pouch on its tail?

Seahorse: the female deposits her eggs in the male's pouch, where he carries them and regulates the fluid around them until he expels fully formed miniature young.

Where does a male emperor penguin keep its egg through the Antarctic winter?

On his feet: he balances the egg on top of them under a fold of skin and eats nothing while the female feeds at sea. In no other penguin species does the male incubate alone.

Which Norse god is called 'All-Father', father of all gods and men?

Odin is called All-Father in the Prose Edda, and in the Norse creation story he is one of three gods who give life to the first man and woman, Ask and Embla.

Which Titan swallowed his children Demeter, Hestia, Hera, Hades and Poseidon at birth?

Cronus swallowed each newborn to forestall a prophecy that a child would overthrow him; Rhea hid Zeus on Crete and gave Cronus a swaddled stone instead.

Father Time is usually shown carrying an hourglass and which farming tool?

A scythe: the ancient Greeks blurred Chronos, the personification of time, with a harvest god of nearly the same name, and his reaping blade passed down to Father Time.

Cartoonists show Father Time handing over his duties to which allegorical figure?

Baby New Year: Father Time stands for the old year on its way out. Illustrator J. C. Leyendecker popularised the baby on Saturday Evening Post covers, the last of them for January 1943.

Merriam-Webster says a dad joke often turns on an obvious or predictable what?

Wordplay: the dictionary's phrase is 'pun or play on words', and it calls dad jokes 'endearingly corny or unfunny'. It dates the term to 1987, when a Gettysburg Times columnist urged readers to preserve and revere them.

The parable of the Prodigal Son, also called the parable of the Forgiving Father, appears in which Gospel?

Luke: in the parable the father runs to embrace his returning son and kills the fattened calf for a feast, which leaves the dutiful elder brother too angry to go inside.

Which UK campaign group scaled Buckingham Palace in 2004 with a member dressed as Batman?

Fathers 4 Justice member Jason Hatch scaled a palace wall dressed as Batman and stood for hours on a ledge beside the balcony; police said his costume helped them judge he was no threat.

Which 1974 Harry Chapin song about an absent father topped the Billboard Hot 100?

'Cat's in the Cradle' began as a poem by Chapin's wife, Sandy, inspired by her first husband's awkward relationship with his own father; set to music, it became Harry's only number one.

Matt Groening named Homer Simpson after his own father, who was what by birth?

Canadian: Homer Groening was born in Saskatchewan to a Mennonite family and was himself named after the ancient Greek poet, before settling in Portland, Oregon, as a filmmaker and cartoonist.

Dan Castellaneta's early Homer Simpson voice was a loose impression of which actor?

Walter Matthau: Castellaneta began with a loose Matthau impression in The Tracey Ullman Show shorts, then dropped it because it was hard to sustain over long recording sessions.

Which film reveals that Darth Vader is the hero's father?

The Empire Strikes Back: the twist was kept so secret that David Prowse, the man in Vader's suit, was given a false line to speak on set, and the real one was dubbed in afterwards.

The film Mrs Doubtfire is based on a 1987 novel by which author?

Anne Fine's novel is called Madame Doubtfire; in it a divorced father poses as a female nanny so that he can go on caring for his own children.

Who voices Marlin, the overprotective clownfish dad in Finding Nemo?

Albert Brooks was a replacement: William H. Macy had already recorded most of Marlin's dialogue when director Andrew Stanton decided the character needed a lighter touch.

Who played the father in the original 1950 Father of the Bride?

Spencer Tracy was Oscar-nominated as Stanley Banks. MGM organised co-star Elizabeth Taylor's real wedding to Nicky Hilton and used it to promote the film, which opened 12 days later.

Which actress made her film debut as the bride in the 1991 Father of the Bride?

Kimberly Williams's debut caught the eye of country singer Brad Paisley, who saw the film on a date; years later he cast her in one of his music videos, and the two married in 2003.

Father Knows Best began in 1949 in which medium before moving to television?

Radio: Father Knows Best began on NBC radio in 1949 with Robert Young as Jim Anderson. On television CBS dropped it after one season, only for NBC to pick it up and keep it on the air.

Gregory Peck won his Oscar as which widowed small-town lawyer and father, voted American film's greatest hero in 2003?

Atticus Finch was modelled by Harper Lee on her own father, an Alabama lawyer who, like Atticus, defended black clients in a much-publicised criminal trial.

Simba's father Mufasa is killed by which relative in The Lion King?

His younger brother, Scar, throws Mufasa back into the wildebeest stampede. In early drafts Scar was a rogue lion with no blood tie to the king; the writers made them brothers to put the threat inside the family.

How is Papa Smurf visibly different from every other Smurf?

He wears red, not white: Papa Smurf's red trousers and cap set him apart from the rest of the village. The Smurfs began as bit players in Peyo's medieval comic Johan and Peewit and proved so popular they got a series of their own.

Geppetto, the 'father' of Pinocchio, works as what?

A woodcarver: in Collodi's novel a carpenter nicknamed Master Cherry is frightened when a log he is about to carve cries out, so he gives it to Geppetto, who makes the puppet from it.

Which of King Lear's daughters is disowned after saying she loves him 'according to my bond; nor more nor less'?

Cordelia refuses to flatter Lear as her sisters do, so he divides her share of the kingdom between Goneril and Regan and offers her to her suitors without a dowry.

Tevye, the father in Fiddler on the Roof, works as what in the village of Anatevka?

A milkman: with his horse lame, Tevye hauls the milk cart himself and asks God who it would hurt 'If I Were a Rich Man'. He comes from Sholem Aleichem's Yiddish stories of Tevye the Dairyman.

Which playwright created Willy Loman, the failing father of Biff and Happy, in Death of a Salesman?

Arthur Miller wrote the first act in less than a day in a small studio he had built in Roxbury, Connecticut, and the play went on to win the 1949 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

In the 1948 Italian classic Bicycle Thieves, a father and his young son search which city for a stolen bike?

Rome: Vittorio De Sica shot on the city's streets with untrained actors, and his lead, Lamberto Maggiorani, was a factory worker; the wife pawns her dowry bedsheets to redeem the bicycle.

Whose real-life son played his on-screen son in The Pursuit of Happyness?

Will Smith's son Jaden plays Christopher Jr. opposite his father, and the real Chris Gardner, whose spell of homelessness the film dramatises, walks past the pair in a cameo in the final scene.

Which actor plays Ray Kinsella, who builds a ballpark in his cornfield, in Field of Dreams?

Kevin Costner's Ray takes 'If you build it, he will come' to mean a long-dead baseball star, but 'he' turns out to be his late father, John, and the film ends with the two of them playing catch.

In Taken (2008), Liam Neeson's ex-CIA father flies to which European country after his daughter is kidnapped on holiday?

France: the kidnappers are Albanian traffickers, but the holiday and the hunt are in Paris. Bryan Mills delivers his famous 'particular set of skills' speech down the phone before he even boards the plane.

Which Motown group took 'Papa Was a Rollin' Stone' to number one in 1972?

The Temptations' hit was a remake: producer Norman Whitfield first cut the song with The Undisputed Truth, whose single stalled at number 63, then stretched it to 12 minutes for the Temptations.

Which singer-songwriter recorded 'Father and Son' for his 1970 album Tea for the Tillerman?

Cat Stevens wrote it for Revolussia, a planned musical about a boy who wants to join the Russian Revolution against his farmer father's wishes; on the record he sings both parts himself.

'Color Him Father', a 1969 tribute to a stepfather, was a hit for which group?

The Winstons' 'Color Him Father' reached number 7 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1969 and won the Grammy for Best R&B Song; its B-side 'Amen, Brother' holds the much-sampled Amen break.

Which singer topped the country chart in 1969 with 'Daddy Sang Bass', written by Carl Perkins?

Johnny Cash recorded it while Perkins was touring in his show. The uncredited voice singing 'Mama sang tenor' is Jan Howard, and two of the Statler Brothers sing the little brother's line.

Who played the young Vito Corleone in The Godfather Part II?

Robert De Niro had landed a small part in the first Godfather but left for another film. Coppola remembered him, and his young Vito, played mostly in Sicilian dialect, won the Supporting Actor Oscar.

Which Star Trek actor directed the 1987 comedy Three Men and a Baby?

Leonard Nimoy's comedy was the biggest American box-office hit of 1987. A rumour that a boy's ghost can be seen in one scene was false: the figure is a cardboard cutout of Ted Danson.

Cheaper by the Dozen was written by two of twelve children raised by experts in what?

Workplace efficiency: Frank and Lillian Gilbreth were time-and-motion experts. Despite the title, their children were never twelve at once: daughter Mary died in 1912, before the youngest were born.

Which Broadway record did the 1939 hit Life with Father set with 3,224 performances?

Longest-running non-musical: the comedy ran for more than seven years, and no play had beaten its total as of 2025. Co-author Howard Lindsay played Father himself, opposite his wife, Dorothy Stickney.

Archie Bunker was modelled on Alf Garnett, the bigoted father in which BBC sitcom?

Till Death Us Do Part: Johnny Speight's BBC sitcom about bigoted Alf Garnett was the template Norman Lear adapted as All in the Family; Lear also drew on his own father, Herman.

Married... with Children dad Al Bundy sells what for a living?

Shoes: Al Bundy sells women's shoes at Gary's Shoes in a Chicago mall, a far cry from his glory days as a Polk High fullback who scored four touchdowns in one game.

Which fictional address did Archie Bunker call home in Astoria, Queens?

704 Hauser Street lent its name to 704 Hauser, a 1994 spin-off in which a black family, the Cumberbatches, moves into the Bunkers' old house in Queens.

Which actor played widowed dad Danny Tanner, raising three daughters, on Full House?

Bob Saget was the producers' first choice but was tied to a CBS morning show, so John Posey played Danny in a pilot that never aired; Saget took over for the series.

Modern Family's Phil Dunphy, who sees himself as the 'cool dad', is played by whom?

Ty Burrell won two Emmys as Phil; in the pilot Phil has to shoot his own son with a toy gun, because that was the deal if the boy ever shot someone with it.

George Jetson works for which company?

Spacely's Space Sprockets employs George as a 'digital index operator': he pushes buttons on a computer for an hour a day, two days a week, under the short-tempered Cosmo Spacely.

Hank Hill of King of the Hill sells what at Strickland?

Propane: Hank is assistant manager at Strickland Propane, selling 'propane and propane accessories'. Mike Judge set the show in a Texas town modelled on Dallas suburbs such as Garland, where he once lived.

Bob Belcher's three children on Bob's Burgers are Tina, Gene and who?

Louise, the youngest, is voiced by Kristen Schaal and wears a pink hat with rabbit ears; early in development the eldest child was a boy called Daniel, later reworked as Tina.

Which actor plays patriarch Ned Stark in the first season of Game of Thrones?

Sean Bean: Ned Stark, lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North, is executed in the first season's penultimate episode, 'Baelor'.

Charles, the 'Pa' of the Little House books, was the father of which author?

Laura Ingalls Wilder's 'Pa' was a farmer and carpenter who played the violin and kept the family on the move until he promised his wife they would settle; De Smet, South Dakota, became their final home.

Peter Griffin of Family Guy is voiced by which series creator?

Seth MacFarlane voices Peter, Stewie, Brian and Quagmire. He based Peter's voice on security guards he overheard while studying at the Rhode Island School of Design.

In Roald Dahl's Danny, the Champion of the World, Danny's father poaches which birds?

Pheasants: Danny's widowed father William, who runs a filling station, poaches pheasants from Mr Victor Hazell's wood, and Danny's scheme of sleeping pills in raisins nets scores of them.

Which Philippine president proclaimed the third Sunday of June as Father's Day in 1988?

Corazon Aquino's Proclamation No. 266 praised Filipino mothers and fathers for instilling 'love, respect, discipline, industry and enterprise' at home, and hers is the date the public went on keeping.

Which comedian played accident-prone dad Clark Griswold in the National Lampoon's Vacation films?

Chevy Chase's Griswold began in Vacation '58, a John Hughes story for National Lampoon in which the family drives to Disneyland and Dad shoots Walt Disney in the leg; the film sends them to the invented Walley World instead.

Which German-speaking country holds Vatertag on the second Sunday of June rather than Ascension Day?

Austria: Vatertag falls on the second Sunday of June and is not a public holiday, unlike the Ascension Day hikes across the German border.

Estonia's Isadepäev is a national holiday and an established day for doing what?

Flying the flag: Isadepäev, the second Sunday of November, is an official flag day in Estonia, as Father's Day is in neighbouring Finland.

In Stranger Things, which police chief becomes the adoptive father of Eleven?

Jim Hopper, who lost his own daughter Sara, hides Eleven in his cabin, and at the end of season two Dr Owens hands him a forged birth certificate that makes her Jane Hopper.

Which actor played Indiana Jones's father in The Last Crusade, though only twelve years older than Harrison Ford?

Sean Connery at first turned the part down because of that small age gap. Steven Spielberg, a fan of his 007 films, felt no one else could play the role as well.

Which Indian independence leader, fondly known as Bapu, is regarded in India as the 'Father of the Nation'?

Mahatma Gandhi's nickname Bapu is an endearment roughly meaning 'father'. His birthday is kept across India as a national holiday, Gandhi Jayanti.

Which Los Angeles Lakers star became half of the NBA's first father-son duo to take the court together?

LeBron James took the court alongside his eldest son Bronny in the Lakers' 2024 season opener against Minnesota. The Lakers had drafted Bronny that summer with the 55th overall pick.

Which father and son hit back-to-back home runs while playing together for the Seattle Mariners?

Ken Griffey Sr. and Jr. homered one after the other against the California Angels in 1990, the only time a father and son have done so. Two weeks earlier they had become MLB's first father-son teammates.

Which Motown star wrote the song 'Isn't She Lovely' to celebrate the birth of his daughter Aisha?

Stevie Wonder opens the track with a newborn's first cry and ends it with a recording of himself bathing Aisha. He refused to shorten it for a single, yet airplay alone carried it into the charts.

Which family produced the first father and son who both served as president of the United States?

The Adamses did it first: John Adams was the second president and his son John Quincy Adams the sixth. No other father and son matched them until the Bushes, in 2001.

In Greek myth, which craftsman and father of Icarus built wings of feathers and wax to flee King Minos of Crete?

Daedalus had also built the Labyrinth for Minos. He warned Icarus not to fly too high, but the sun melted the wax and the boy fell into the sea.

Which president issued the first proclamation honouring fathers, over fifty years after the first Father's Day?

Lyndon B. Johnson issued it in 1966, after Congress had twice defeated attempts to recognise the holiday. It became permanent law only in 1972.

In which Oscar-winning Italian film does a father persuade his son that a concentration camp is a game?

Life Is Beautiful has Guido promise his son Giosuè a real tank as first prize for staying hidden. Roberto Benigni, who also directed, won the Best Actor Oscar for the role.

Which ancient Greek chronicler of the Greco-Persian Wars was given the title 'Father of History' by Cicero?

Herodotus earned the title for his Histories, but critics have also branded him the 'Father of Lies' for the strange stories and folk tales he passed on.

In the Bible, God gives which ninety-nine-year-old patriarch a new name taken to mean 'father of a multitude'?

Abraham had been called Abram until then, and in the same chapter his wife Sarai is renamed Sarah. A year later the couple's long-promised son was born.

Which son of Sarah was bound on an altar in the land of Moriah until a ram was offered in his place?

Isaac carried the wood for the sacrifice up the mountain himself and asked his father where the lamb was. An angel called a halt before the knife fell.

Which father gave his favourite son Joseph a coat of many colours, enraging the older brothers?

Jacob favoured Joseph as the son of his old age. The brothers later sold the boy to passing merchants, dipped the coat in goat's blood and let their father believe a wild animal had killed him.

According to Genesis, Shem, Ham and Japheth, from whom the nations branched out, were the sons of which man?

Noah took his sons and their wives into the ark, eight people in all. After the flood he turned farmer, planted a vineyard and got drunk on its wine.

Which son of Enoch has the longest lifespan recorded in the Bible, dying at the age of 969?

Methuselah's name is now a byword for great age. His father Enoch, by contrast, never dies in Genesis at all: 'he was not, for God took him.'

Which Bethlehem sheep farmer showed seven sons to the prophet Samuel before sending for his youngest, David?

Jesse had left David out in the fields minding the sheep. Samuel refused to sit down to eat until the boy was fetched, then anointed him king in front of his brothers.

Which son of King David and Bathsheba succeeded his father and built the First Temple in Jerusalem?

Solomon inherited the project from David, who spent his last years collecting the materials. David had been told that, as a man of war, he could not build it himself.

Which priest was struck mute for doubting the angel Gabriel's news that he would father John the Baptist?

Zechariah got his voice back only at the baby's naming, the moment he wrote 'His name is John' on a tablet. His first words were a hymn of praise now called the Benedictus.

Which Galilean fisherman was left in the boat with the hired men when his two sons went off to follow Jesus?

Zebedee's sons were the apostle John and his brother, whom Jesus nicknamed Boanerges, 'sons of thunder'. That he had hired men at all suggests the fishing business was doing well.

Which priest of Midian, the father-in-law of Moses, urged him to appoint others to judge the smaller disputes?

Jethro watched Moses hear cases alone from morning till evening and warned him he would wear himself out. Moses had first met his daughter Zipporah while fleeing Egypt.

In the parable of the Prodigal Son, what does the father order to be killed for the homecoming feast?

The fatted calf comes with the finest robe, a ring and sandals, all ordered by the father before his son can even finish apologising. The older brother, who never left home, is furious.

In the Ten Commandments, what reward is promised to those who honour their father and mother?

Long life in the land makes this the one the New Testament calls 'the first commandment with a promise', when it quotes the commandment to children.

Which Aramaic word for father does Jesus use when praying in Gethsemane on the night of his arrest?

Abba is the form used when speaking directly to one's father, and Mark's Gospel keeps the Aramaic: 'Abba, Father, everything is possible for you.' Paul repeats the word in two of his letters.

In Matthew's Gospel, astonished townspeople ask whether Jesus is not the son of a man in which trade?

Carpenter is the traditional translation of the Greek word tekton, which could cover craftsmen working in wood, iron or stone. The townspeople never use the father's name.

Which synagogue leader begged Jesus to save his dying daughter, whom Jesus raised with the words 'Talitha koum'?

Jairus was told on the way home that the girl had already died, but Jesus went on regardless. The Aramaic phrase means 'Little girl, I say to you, get up!'

Which man fled the destruction of Sodom with his daughters while his wife became a pillar of salt?

Lot had been warned by angels not to look back. He and his daughters first sheltered in the small town of Zoar, then moved to a cave in the hills.

Which Old Testament book says a child trained 'in the way he should go' will not depart from it when old?

Proverbs comes back to parents again and again, and its first piece of advice begins, 'My son, hear the instruction of thy father.'

Which New Testament letter tells fathers to bring their children up 'in the training and admonition of the Lord'?

Ephesians gives the instruction straight after telling children to obey their parents. The same chapter goes on to describe the 'armour of God'.

Which book closes most Christian Old Testaments with a promise to turn 'the heart of the fathers to the children'?

Malachi says the prophet Elijah will be sent back to do it before the day of the Lord. In most Christian Bibles nothing comes between that promise and the New Testament.

In Genesis, which hairy elder twin lost his blind father's blessing to a brother disguised in goatskins?

Esau had already traded away his birthright for a bowl of lentil stew when he came in famished from the fields. Their mother Rebekah planned the goatskin trick.