&

Today is the day to honor the ampersand — you know, that strange curly symbol that’s often used in place of the word “and” in logos and places where a person writing a sentence is trying to save some time, or is running out of space. 

If you’re like most people, you probably give very little thought to this symbol and that makes it even more important that it should have its own holiday — every year, September 8 is known as National Ampersand Day. 

Here’s some interesting things you may not know about this symbol most of us use often:
The symbol “&” has been around for more than 1,500 years.
The ampersand originally meant “et” or “and” in Latin.
The ampersand was actually a part of the English alphabet during the early 19th century. It was the last letter in the alphabet.
The ampersand is both a ligature and a logogram.
The ampersand is a commonly used special character for people’s passwords. 
A lot of companies and brands use ampersands in their names and/or logos — such as, Ben & Jerry’s, M&M, Smith & Wesson, A&E, AT&T, and Barnes & Noble.

The symbol actually has a long and storied history….
The origin of ampersand is from the Latin Language and the alphabet position as per Latin is 27. The symbol is a logogram and began as a ligature of the letters “et,” Latin for the world “and.” The symbol goes back thousands of years but first showed up in English during the late 18th century. During the late Middle Ages, single letters that were not only letters, but could also function as a word, such as “A” and “I,” were referred to as letters by using the phrase “per se.” That phrase was used to clarify that the letter was being used in that context and not the word.
For example, if someone wanted to refer just to the letter “I” and not the word “I,” then they would say I per se, I.” This means in Latin “I by itself.” When the 27th letter of the English alphabet was added, “&” would be referred to as “& per se, and.” That meant “& per se, means and.” Eventually, that evolved into the word we now use, ampersand.

National Ampersand Day was invented by Chaz DeSimone, the founder of Amper Art in 2015. Amber Art is a website that was founded in 2011 — it showcases ampersand art posters that DeSimone has created.

So today I’m going to make sure to use an ampersand in everything I write…. 
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