Is it on March 13 or another date?

The national observance is March 13. A separate local Good Samaritan Day in Augusta, Georgia falls on March 20, and Random Acts of Kindness Day is February 17.

Did Congress create National Good Samaritan Day?

No. No congressional resolution or law establishes it, and the often-cited 1975 Senate resolution does not exist in the record.

Why is it on March 13?

March 13 is the date Kitty Genovese was killed in 1964, the case tied to the day's message about helping strangers. No source documents that the date was deliberately chosen or who chose it.

National Good Samaritan Day

Next celebratedSaturday, March 13, 2027

An observance on March 13 encouraging acts of kindness and help for strangers in need.

See how to celebrate

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Last updated March 18, 2026 · by the Holiday Calendar TeamHave an update or spot an error?

YEARLY DATEMarch 13

OBSERVED INUnited States

CATEGORYAwareness

SUBCATEGORYPhilanthropy

ORIGIN

Community Origin

FOUNDING ENTITY

Not documented

FIRST OBSERVED

Not documented

HOW THE HOLIDAY CAME TO BE

An acts-of-kindness day no one has claimed.

No founder or establishing act is recorded for National Good Samaritan Day. The day is popularly linked to the 1964 murder of Kitty Genovese in Queens, New York, but no source documents who chose March 13 or when the observance began.

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INTRO

The day about stepping in, built on a story of looking away

National Good Samaritan Day asks people to do one hard thing: step in for a stranger. Its most-told backstory is about a night when, the legend goes, no one did.

The day is popularly tied to the 1964 murder of Kitty Genovese in Queens, New York. For years the story held that 38 neighbors watched from their windows and did nothing. That version has been picked apart for decades.

At least some neighbors reacted. The famous number was inflated. What survives is a smaller, truer account of how bystanders freeze, and a day that quietly asks you not to.

ORIGINS

Good Samaritan Day history

INTRODUCTION

The phrase at the center of the day is old. It comes from a story Jesus tells in the Gospel of Luke, retold for two thousand years. A traveler is beaten and left on the road. A priest passes. A Levite passes. A Samaritan stops and helps.

Since then, a "Good Samaritan" has meant anyone who helps a stranger in trouble. The modern American observance attaches that ancient idea to a single, specific night.

CHAPTER 01

A murder becomes a legend

Kitty Genovese was 28. She was killed near her apartment in the Kew Gardens section of Queens, early on March 13, 1964. That date is the one the observance now falls on.

Two weeks later, the New York Times ran a front-page story headlined "37 Who Saw Murder Didn't Call the Police." It claimed 38 neighbors saw or heard the attack and stayed silent. The account spread fast and hardened into a national parable about apathy.

CHAPTER 02

The legend unravels

The tidy version did not hold. Later reporting and review found the witness story badly overstated. Some neighbors had, in fact, reacted, and the real picture was messier than the headline allowed.

The man who killed Genovese, Winston Moseley, was convicted and spent the rest of his life in prison. What lingered was not his name but the myth about the people at the windows.

CHAPTER 03

A holiday with no paper trail

The day itself carries no such record. No founder is named in any authoritative source, and no document shows who set it on March 13 or when it began.

One claim gets repeated often: that the U.S. Senate created the day by resolution in 1975. The congressional record shows no such thing. What remains is a widely kept day of kindness whose origins, unlike its namesake parable, were never written down.

WHY THIS DAY MATTERS

Why National Good Samaritan Day Matters

PSYCHOLOGY

Alone, 85 percent helped; with four others watching, 31 percent.

The Genovese case gave psychology the bystander effect, mapped by researchers John Darley and Bibb Latane. Their experiments found people far less likely to help as the number of onlookers grew.

EMERGENCY

It is tied to the rise of 911

The killing is often credited as one of the factors behind the modern 911 system, which became the national emergency number in 1968. Historians treat that direct link as popular lore more than settled fact.

LAW

It shares a name with a legal shield

The same parable that names the day also names Good Samaritan laws, which protect bystanders who give emergency aid from liability. Those statutes turn an ancient moral into a modern legal protection for anyone who stops to help.

TIMELINE

Timeline

Kitty Genovese is killed

Genovese was murdered near her Queens apartment on March 13, the date the observance now carries.

The Times prints the bystander story

On March 27 the New York Times ran "37 Who Saw Murder Didn't Call the Police," seeding a national apathy legend.

Bystander research and 911 arrive

Darley and Latane published their bystander study the same year 911 became the national emergency number.

A brother reopens the case

Bill Genovese's documentary "The Witness" laid out the case against the original 1964 reporting.

The killer dies in prison

Winston Moseley died behind bars at 81, after more than five decades in custody.

GOOD TO KNOW

Surprising facts about National Good Samaritan Day

At least two neighbors actually stepped in

One neighbor, Robert Mozer, shouted "Let that girl alone!" and drove the attacker off for a time. Another resident found Genovese and called the police.

The name appears once in the Congressional Record

A full search of the record turns up a single 'Good Samaritan Day,' and it is a 1989 local observance in Augusta, Georgia, held on March 20. It is not the national March 13 day.

One frozen neighbor gave the story its famous line

Karl Ross hesitated and asked a friend what to do, and the friend said not to get involved. His words, "I didn't want to get involved," came to stand in for the whole case.

The parable's hero was an outsider, not a neighbor

In the story Jesus tells, the priest and the Levite pass the wounded man by. The one who stops is a Samaritan, a member of a group at odds with the victim's own people.

The killer was hunting a stranger at random

Winston Moseley was not after Genovese in particular. He was driving Queens looking for a victim and later gave no motive for the attack.

GET INVOLVED

How to Observe National Good Samaritan Day

Step in for a stranger who needs help

Find one real moment to assist someone you do not know, whether carrying a bag, giving directions, or checking on a person in distress. Do the small, concrete thing the day is named for.

LEARN

Learn how to help safely in an emergency

Read up on how to size up a scene and summon help before you act. Knowing the steps makes you more likely to intervene than to freeze.

KNOW

Know your local emergency number

Make sure everyone in your home can reach 911 or your country's equivalent fast. A single call is often the most useful thing a bystander can do.

READ

Read the parable behind the name

Spend a few minutes with the parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10 to see where the phrase began. It frames kindness as help offered across difference, not only to your own.

SUPPORT

Support people who help strangers in need

Give time or money to a group that shows up for people in crisis in your area. Kindness scales when it backs the organizations already doing the work.

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