Despite the rally, however, major indexes ended down for the week, with the first diagnosis of Ebola in a patient in the United States and protests in Hong Kong among the main catalysts for sharp selling earlier in the week.
The Labor Department reported that U.S. non-farm payrolls rose by 248,000 last month and the jobless rate fell two-tenths of a point to 5.9 percent.
"There were a number of fears in the market, and the market had been giving up a lot of its gains. I think the jobs report took away a lot of the near-term concerns about the pace of the U.S. economy's (growth), and short-covering helped," said Robbert Van Batenburg, director of market strategy at Newedge USA LLC in New York.
All 10 S&P sectors ended in positive territory, though the S&P energy index <.SPNY> was the day's weakest and ended barely higher following further declines in oil prices
Financial and healthcare shares were among the day's biggest positives. The Dow Jones transportation average <.DJT> also rallied, ending up 2.1 percent, its biggest daily percentage gain since March, as airline stocks jumped. Shares of Delta Air Lines (>> Delta Air Lines, Inc.) rose 4.7 percent to $36.95.
The Russell 2000 index <.TOY> rose 0.8 percent, but was down 1.3 percent for the week, its fifth straight week of losses.
The Dow Jones industrial average <.DJI> rose 208.64 points, or 1.24 percent, to 17,009.69, the S&P 500 <.SPX> gained 21.73 points, or 1.12 percent, to 1,967.9 and the Nasdaq Composite <.IXIC> added 45.43 points, or 1.03 percent, to 4,475.62.
For the week, the Dow was down 0.6 percent, the S&P 500 was down 0.8 percent and the Nasdaq was down 0.8 percent.
The largest percentage gainer on the New York Stock Exchange was Zendesk INC (>> Zendesk Inc), which rose 16.93 percent to $25.55, while the largest percentage decliner was Cliffs Natural Resources (>> Cliffs Natural Resources Inc), down 16.80 percent at $8.32.
Among the most active stocks on the NYSE were Rite Aid (>> Rite Aid Corporation), up 0.80 percent at $5.03 and Brazil's Petrobras
On the Nasdaq, Apple (>> Apple Inc.), down 0.3 percent to $99.62, and Yahoo (>> Yahoo! Inc.), up 1.3 percent at $41.03, were among the most actively traded.
Advancing issues outnumbered declining ones on the NYSE by 2,067 to 989, for a 2.09-to-1 ratio on the upside; on the Nasdaq, 1,776 issues rose and 895 fell for a 1.98-to-1 ratio also favoring advancers.
The benchmark S&P 500 index posted 14 new 52-week highs and five new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 36 new highs and 54 new lows.
About 6.5 billion shares changed hands on U.S. exchanges, compared with the 7 billion average for the last five sessions, according to data from BATS Global Markets.
(Editing by James Dalgleish)
By Caroline Valetkevitch