Mighty-O is gearing up for our celebration of National Doughnut Day on June 5!  We’ll be giving away free mini donuts in our shop all day.

National Doughnut Day isn’t just a silly holiday someone made up to have an excuse to eat donuts.  It actually has roots back in World War I.  The Salvation Army sent nurses to the front lines in France who not only took care of the physically sick, but also the homesick soldiers.  Part of their duty was to make the soldiers feel at home.  One of the ways they did this was by making and serving donuts for the soldiers.  They chose to serve donuts because they were considered a quintessentially American food.  These donuts were a great comfort to the soldiers, and the Salvation Army women who served them were soon known as “Doughnut Lassies.”

There is even a song in a 1918 songbook celebrating donuts’ role in WWI:

“A doughnut’s just a doughnut, boys, ’til you are “over there,”
And day and night you’re in a trench away in France somewhere;
You get a fresh-made doughnut, seems it comes from heaven above,
That doughnut, boys, reminds you of a slice of mother’s love.”

During the Great Depression, the Salvation Army was trying to help people on the homefront.  They again turned to donuts as a solution.  In 1938, the Chicago Salvation Army established National Doughnut Day as a fundraiser to help the needy.  Now, National Doughnut Day is a great way to celebrate an iconic American food.

For more information about the history of National Doughnut Day, see Paul R. Mullins, Glazed America: A History of the Doughnut (2008) and John T. Edge, Donuts: An American Passion (2006).