Sweetest Day hails from all the way back in 1922 when a dozen of Cleveland’s candy companies banded together to make the day a little sweeter for some of the city’s most vulnerable people. they distributed more than 20,000 boxes of candy to “newsboys, orphans, old folks, and the poor.”

The idea caught on with movie celebrities during the early days of the talkies. Starlets like Theda Bara, who was known as a “bad girl” of film, was often seen distributing candy to people attending movies or plays as well as giving treats to patients in hospitals.

Eventually, the idea of Sweetest Day as a vehicle for promoting smiles and good vibes took solid root in the country’s mid-section. Areas like Michigan, Indiana and Ohio really fused the meaning of the day with good, old-fashioned mid-western values like honesty and caring for your neighbors.

On Sweetest Day, folks give flowers, small gifts, love trinkets and, of course, candy to those they care about most. Seventeen US states celebrate the occasion.