The First Thanksgiving

From fall feast to national holiday


by Damon Goldsmith

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The First Thanksgiving

The first American Thanksgiving was celebrated in 1621, to commemorate the harvest reaped by the Plymouth Colony after a harsh winter. In that year Governor William Bradford proclaimed a day of thanksgiving. The colonists celebrated it as a traditional English harvest feast, to which they invited the local Wampanoag Indians.

Days of thanksgiving were celebrated throughout the colonies after fall harvests. All thirteen colonies did not, however, celebrate Thanksgiving at the same time until October 1777. George Washington was the first president to declare the holiday, in 1789.

A New National Holiday

By the mid–1800s, many states observed a Thanksgiving holiday. Meanwhile, the poet and editor Sarah J. Hale had begun lobbying for a national Thanksgiving holiday. During the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln, looking for ways to unite the nation, discussed the subject with Hale. In 1863 he gave his Thanksgiving Proclamation, declaring the last Thursday in November a day of thanksgiving.

In 1939, 1940, and 1941 Franklin D. Roosevelt, seeking to lengthen the Christmas shopping season, proclaimed Thanksgiving the third Thursday in November. Controversy followed, and Congress passed a joint resolution in 1941 decreeing that Thanksgiving should fall on the fourth Thursday of November, where it remains.

Weird Cookies!!!

DEAR ABBY: I work in a small office with about 20 people. One lady often brings homemade cookies, cakes, candies and breads to the office. We eat and enjoy all she makes.
Yesterday I had to drop off some work at her home. She said she was making cookies and invited me in. Abby, her house and kitchen were filthy! Cats everywhere, some sticking their noses in the cookie dough. Insects were crawling over stacks of unwashed dishes and on the kitchen floor. I can't understand why no one became violently ill from eating what she prepared.
There is no way I will ever again eat anything she brings to the office. How can I stop eating her food without explaining why? Should I tell my co-workers what I saw?

-- Feeling ill in Illinois



DEAR FEELING ILL: If you tell your co-workers what you saw you'll only humiliate the woman. A more effective solution would be to tell the office manager what you saw and request that a new policy be instituted that discourages bringing homemade goodies to the office.

Now dear MBS student, it's your turn to leave your opinion down here: