As a child, I always thought Thanksgiving was nothing more than the time of year when my kindergarten class colored in pictures of turkeys and had a shorter week. As I grew older, I understood that Thanksgiving was much more than a short holiday, but an important event in our history. Along with the historic portion of Thanksgiving, there are also many traditions people partake in.

Thanksgiving is held every fourth Wednesday of November, which means this year Thanksgiving is on November 22. Growing up, you may have learned all about Thanksgiving, how the Pilgrims and Native Americans shared a meal after the long, gruesome winter. Well, if you don’t remember your younger years, or were simply never taught about Thanksgiving, here is some important history about Turkey Day.

Many of the 102 passengers aboard the Mayflower stayed on the disease-ridden boat in attempt to try survive the winter. Only about half of the original colonists survived through the first winter. As the surviving settlers moved ashore in May, they were greeted by an Abenaki Native American, who spoke English. Later, he returned with the infamous Squanto, who taught the Pilgrims how to harvest corn and collect food, which the settlers desperately needed. Along with teaching the Pilgrims how to find food, he also helped them form an alliance with the Wampanoag tribe, a local tribe in Massachusetts Bay Colony. This alliance would endure for more than 50 years, and it remains as one of the only examples of harmony between European Colonists and Native Americans. In November 1621, the Pilgrims experienced their first successful corn harvest! To celebrate this great success, they invited the chief of their allied tribe to a feast. This feast is known as the “First Thanksgiving”. Although many people know this story, this event in the 1600s was not a holiday until the height of the Civil War. Abraham Lincoln, in 1863, officially marked the third Thursday of every November as Thanksgiving Day.

Now, this deeper understanding of what Thanksgiving is allows us to better look into the many traditions of Turkey Day. Thanksgiving is celebrated much differently from house to house, but personally, my family has a lot of traditions. Every morning, my family puts on the Annual Macy Thanksgiving Day Parade and prepare to cook our feast. Our feast does not consist of many people, usually just our immediate family, but many people have over 10 or more people over for their feast! Along with this, many people also make a friends-giving, which is a spin off of Thanksgiving. This consists of a person, or people, preparing a potluck Thanksgiving feast for a group of friends. Instead of family attending, all of a person’s friends come, usually bringing food, and feast together.

Along with these small traditions, many people use Thanksgiving to signify the holiday season and prepare for their religious celebrations. This is also the time of year many families decorate their houses with colorful lights, and other parts of the country, not Arizona, sadly, experience a snow fall. Along with using Thanksgiving to welcome in a new season, many people also associate Thanksgiving with different holiday shows. ACP indulges in this tradition by showing “A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving”. Building off of this, many people also start watching holiday movies, such as “The Miracle on 34th Street”, which actually has a scene that takes place on Thanksgiving Day.

Knights, Thanksgiving Day is a holiday like no other with many different traditions for people to celebrate. Overall, Thanksgiving is a day to celebrate those who make you happy, things you are thankful for, and everything in between. Have a great Thanksgiving Day, Knights!

https://www.history.com/topics/thanksgiving/history-of-thanksgiving

https://www.macys.com/social/parade/