Thanksgiving Day
Nast, Thomas. Uncle Sam's Thanksgiving dinner / Th. Nast. , 1869. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2002714704/.
Early in America’s colonial period, a small, struggling group of religious dissenters, having crossed the Atlantic to escape persecution, gathered with native people to feast and give thanks to God. The year was 1564, the place Fort Caroline, Florida. These Huguenots, or French protestants, were greatly helped by the local Timucua people. While pumpkin, roasted not pied, was likely on the menu, there is some dispute whether or not alligator was the main dish. A year later, a bit further south in St Augustine, a group of Spanish immigrants shared Thanksgiving services and a feast with the native people.
In 1598, colonists from Mexico crossed the Chihuahuan Desert to settle in present day New Mexico. They had run out of food and water. All seemed lost when they stumbled across the Rio Grande. With the help of the native folks, the colonists organized a great feast, which included fish, a bonfire, and thanksgiving to God.
Following the strict orders of their sponsors, the first order of business for the founders of the Berkley Plantation on the James River in Virginia during 1619, was to proclaim a day of Thanksgiving. Unlike other earlier Thanksgiving observances, this one was a day of fasting, not feasting, and the native people were not invited.
Living in rural England in the early 1600’s, the members of the Scrooby Congregation wished to pursue a personal, Biblically centered faith, free of hierarchy and ceremony. Unfortunately, this put them at odds with the church and king of England. They fled to Holland, but unable to make a living, decided to try North America. The first winter in New England took the lives of nearly half the immigrants. By spring of 1621, when hope for survival had almost disappeared, a miracle happened. Squanto, the last surviving member of the Patuxet Tribe came to immigrant’s aid. He taught them skills needed to survive on the North Atlantic coast. That fall, they brought in the greatest harvest any of those pilgrims had ever seen, and it was time to celebrate.
According to a letter sent by one of them to a friend in England, the celebration included gathering with friends, feasting, games, and giving thanks to God. Honored guests were the Wampanoag people, who brought venison. The letter tells how the governor sent men “fowling”. The governor’s own account tells us “there was great store of wild turkeys”. So, although maybe not the main dish, turkey was certainly on the menu.
In 1789, both houses of Congress passed a resolution asking the new President to declare a day of thanksgiving in honor of the Constitution and new system of government. President Washington designated Thursday, 26 November 1789 as “a day of public thanksgiving and prayer”. Alexander Hamilton proclaimed, “No citizen of the U.S. shall refrain from turkey on Thanksgiving Day.” Pumpkin pie, which made its appearance in 1671, was quite popular by the 1780’s. The President himself, spent the day going to church at St. Paul’s Chapel in New York and distributing food and beer to the city’s destitute.
Presidents Adams and Madison regularly declared days of thanksgiving. In the following years, state governments continued to proclaim days of thanksgiving, but nationally the custom fell out of fashion.
Widowed in 1822, Sarah Hale turned to writing to support her five children. She wrote the poem “Mary Had a Little Lamb”, edited by Lydia Child, who later wrote “Over the River and through the Woods”. Sarah Hale wrote the novel Northwood, in which she describes a New England Thanksgiving, featuring roast turkey and pumpkin pie. She became the first women editor of a magazine; using her influence to preserve Mount Vernon and build the Bunker Hill Monument, her greatest cause was that of Thanksgiving.
As divisions in America grew deeper, Sarah Hale hoped a national day of thanksgiving would unite the country. In her editorials, she explained “Independence Day is the exponent of civil freedom. Thanksgiving Day is the national pledge of Christian faith in God, acknowledging Him as the dispenser of blessings.” In 1863, using her influence with Secretary of State William Seward and writing directly to President Lincoln, she achieved a Presidential proclamation calling for a day of thanksgiving on the last Thursday of November. Presidents have issued Thanksgiving proclamations every year since. The Federal Holiday law of 1870 made Christmas, New Years, Independence Day and “any day appointed by the President of the United States as a day of thanksgiving” federal holidays.
During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Thanksgiving was held on the last Thursday in November or sometimes the first Thursday in December. In 1939, in an effort to extend the Christmas shopping season, FDR moved Thanksgiving to the fourth Thursday of November. This caused an uproar and was joked about in movies and by comedians. Some began referring to the holiday as “Franksgiving”. It took an act of Congress, in 1941, to permanently make Thanksgiving the fourth Thursday in November.