Thanksgiving is perhaps America’s best holiday. It’s not overly commercial, nor is it either secular nor identified with a particular religion.
The Detroit Lions aside, today is rich with tradition for many families. Quietly, we bond with one another without text messaging or Facebook. That’s enough to give thanks for right there.
Though days of thanksgiving were celebrated long before Europeans settled in the Americas, our current Thanksgiving tradition began in 1621. As every first-grader in America knows, the Plymouth colonists and the Wamapanoag Indians shared an autumn harvest feast to celebrate the colony’s first year.
According to the website History.com, after the Pilgrims’ first successful corn harvest, Gov. William Bradford proclaimed a feast, though it may not have carried the Thanksgiving name and venison, not turkey, was likely the larger part of the menu. Pumpkin pie was almost surely absent from that first table, as the colonists were nearly out of sugar and they had no ovens.
Regardless, the tradition caught on. During the Revolutionary War, the Continental Congress proclaimed several days of thanksgiving, and in 1789 George Washington issued the first Thanksgiving proclamation by the new United States government to celebrate the war’s end and the adoption of the U.S. Constitution.
In 1817, New York became the first state to officially recognize an annual thanksgiving; other states followed, but each had its own day of celebration. For whatever reason, Thanksgiving was a Yankee tradition; Southern states didn’t celebrate it. So it can be assumed that the pecan pie was a later addition.
The push to make it a permanent national holiday began, like many campaigns, with the press. In this case, magazine editor Sarah Josepha Hale — author of the nursery rhyme “Mary Had a Little Lamb” — launched the campaign. For the next 36 years she published numerous editorials and sent many letters to presidents, senators, congressmen and governors.
Finally, in 1863, President Lincoln declared a holiday on the final Thursday of November, in a proclamation, at the height of the Civil War, that asked God to “commend to his tender care all those who have become widow, orphans, mourners or sufferers” and to “heal the wounds of the nation.”
After the war, that Thanksgiving date endured until 1939, when Franklin Roosevelt moved the holiday up a week to attempt to stimulate Christmas shopping during the Great Depression. After his meddling was ridiculed by Republicans as “Franksgiving,” in 1941 he reluctantly signed a bill moving Thanksgiving to the fourth Thursday of the month. It’s been the same ever since.
The U.S. Census Bureau put together these facts in honor of today, the 148th national day of Thanksgiving:
• 242 million — the number of turkeys expected to be raised on U.S. farms this year, down about 2 percent from last year. The top turkey-producing state is Minnesota (Washington is not a major producer of turkeys).
• 735 million — the pounds of cranberries forecast to be produced in the United States this year. As those who like to visit the Long Beach Peninsula know, Washington is a major producer of this fruit.
• 1.9 billion — pounds of sweet potatoes produced in the United States last year. In addition, some $5.5 million worth of sweet spuds were imported last year, with the majority coming from the Dominican Republic. Again, Washington is not a player.
• 13.8 pounds — the quantity of turkey consumed by the typical American in 2007, along with 5.2 pounds of sweet potatoes. It would be best, however, if you don’t try to eat all of that today!
