Every year, in the U.S.A, Thanksgiving is observed as a national holiday. This year it will be celebrated on November 26th, which is the last Thursday of this month. Thanksgiving is something, all Americans are excited about. But, what is the history of thanksgiving?
History of thanksgiving in the USA
In the 1960s, the pilgrims in the new world use to celebrate their first harvest. At this time, the English Pilgrims in Massachusetts at Plymouth Plantation use to share their meals with their neighboring native Americans. This feast used to last for three days. Some historians claim that this tradition started in Florida 50 years ago than it started in North America.
In 1789 on 28th September, the president of the US asked federal Congress to give the nation a specific day for thanksgiving. It was 26th November in 1789, the fourth Thursday, George Washington proclaimed to be “Day of Public Thanksgiving”. In the new constitution, it was the first time when thanksgiving was celebrated. The dates and days for thanksgiving kept changing with the change of president. In the year 1863, Abraham Lincoln proclaimed that Thanksgiving should be celebrated every year on the last Thursday of November.
History of thanksgiving Turkey
According to history, on the first-ever thanksgiving dinner in the U.S in 1621, five deer were killed by the Native Americans as a gift to the colonist. That year, it was deer which everyone had a feast on. Turkey as a dinner in the US for Thanksgiving dates before 1862, the day Lincoln’s nationalized the holiday.
Each year on Thanksgiving, the United States president sends a hand-selected and ‘pardons’ a turkey to live its remaining days on a farm. But, according to the history of thanksgiving in the USA, there were many presidents before George HW Bush to allow such a pardon. According to the beliefs of Whitehouse, Abraham Lincoln’s son, Tad pleaded to his father by saying that like others even the turkey has the right to live, and then, the turkey was pardoned.
To sum up the history of thanksgiving, here are a few of the history of thanksgiving facts:
- The first time thanksgiving was celebrated in the year 1621 with 90 Wampanoag Indians and 50 Pilgrims. This celebration lasted for three days with only 5 women among the crowd.
- The Initial thanksgiving dinner had goose, duck, venison, lobster, oyster, fish, and eel on the menu.
- Sarah Josepha Hale, the author of “Mary Had A Little Lamb,” wrote 17 letters every year to convince Lincoln for making Thanksgiving a national holiday.
According to the American history of thanksgiving, every year professional plays football. It was in the year 1876, the tradition of thanksgiving football began. The game was then between Princeton and Yale. The lightings, decoration, and traditions of thanksgiving are so fabulous that people from around the world travel to the USA.
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