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National Singles Week (the third full week in September) has been listed on many promotional calendars. Two online greeting card companies have created cards for the occasion. A few years ago, the Washington Post published a story about National Singles Week, as did a few other newspapers. But despite these modest forms of publicity, National Singles Week was virtually a secret until 2001 when the American Association for Single People (formerly the membership division of Unmarried America) took out ads in newspapers and ran commercials on radio stations. We encouraged newspaper feature editors to use this week as an opportunity to publish stories about single and unmarried people in their communities, and to interview our book author members who have formed a Speaker's Bureau for this occasion. Unfortunately, these efforts were overshadowed by the tragic events of September 11, 2001. As a result, the public relations work did not create the desired results. In the following years, we renewed and redoubled our efforts, but under a slightly different banner. Many of the millions of unmarried Americans do not identify with the word "single" because they are parents, have partners, or are recently widowed. And yet many other unmarried Americans proudly describe themselves as "single." In order to accommodate the interest and identities
of as many unmarried people as possible, since 2002 we have been
commemorating the third week of September as Unmarried
and Single Americans
Week. Other individuals and groups continue call it National
Singles Week. Whatever name you use, please join in the celebration. |