Who Was Sadie Hawkins and Why Does She Have a Dance Named After Her?

Sadie Hawkins’ Day, which evolved into an American folk-holiday, doesn’t originate from a dance at all, but rather from a fictional race. Much like the Great Pumpkin, Sadie is a pop-culture phenomenon spawned from what we old folks used to call the Funnies.

Sadie was the product of cartoonist Al Capp’s fertile imagination. She was a character in…