Thanksgiving 1565 and Thanksgiving 2009

Ever wonder what the first official thanksgiving was like back in 1619?  It was nothing like how we celebrate today.  Oh you thought that the first one was with the pilgrims in 1621, right.  Not so.  The first official thanksgiving has been recorded as having taken place on September 8, 1565 when some 600 Spanish settlers landed where now St. Augustine is.  This was a thanksgiving for their safe arrival in the new world.

On December 4, 1619 a group of English settlers arrived at a place known as Charles Cittie.  Their charter required that the group should mark that arrival with thanksgiving and do so on an annual basis.

The pilgrims did not hold a true thanksgiving until 1623 (after they had gone from communal farming to private farming).  Regular thanksgiving was observed thereafter most every year, but as a religious event and in church, rather than the big meal we associate with the holiday today.

Over time the holiday was celebrated on different dates, without continuity, within the different colonies. The Massachusetts Bay colony marked the holiday for the first time in 1630 and regularly for fifty years.

During the early years when the Pilgrims sat down to eat, they sat on benches, tree stumps or on the ground. They ate most of their food with their hands, without utensils.

The first national day of Thanksgiving was proclaimed by the Continental Congress to be observed on December 18, 1777.  President Washington proclaimed a Thanksgiving holiday to be observed on October 3, 1789, as well as 1795.  This proclamation of Thanksgiving was issued on a fairly regular basis every year thereafter, though the date was not consistent.

Abraham Lincoln fixed the date for Thanksgiving in the midst of the Civil War.  On October 3, 1863 President Lincoln proclaimed a national day of Thanksgiving to be observed on the last Thursday of every November every year thereafter.  There was one exception to that under President Franklin Roosevelt when there were five Thursdays in 1938.  President Roosevelt proclaimed Thanksgiving to be the fourth Thursday that month. Roosevelt hoped it would encourage Christmas shopping during the depression, by having it earlier in the year. Not all states followed the president’s direction, however.

Did you know that it is not likely that the Pilgrims’ first Thanksgiving emphasized turkey?  There is a lot of evidence that wild turkeys were abundant in the area and that they were part of the meal, but not the center piece it is today.  It is far more likely that the focus of the meal was venison, lobster, eel, mussels, fish, Indian corn, radishes, turnips and spinach.

The tradition of having turkey at every Thanksgiving meal did not start with the Pilgrims.  Surprisingly, Benjamin Franklin favored the turkey as the national bird rather than the eagle.  Mr. Franklin felt that the turkey was somehow more respectable than the eagle, which he felt was of bad moral character. Although losing out as the national bird, the turkey eventually took center stage every Thanksgiving.

So, as you sit down to your Thanksgiving Day meal, think about how far this whole tradition has come since that first Pilgrims feast.  Above all, give thanks to HIM for this free country and our freedom to worship as we please.  We are a rich country in so many ways and it is appropriate that we give thanks to God for that.

Your obedient servant,

Richard Freeman