Thanksgiving Day, is a holiday celebrated in the United States on the fourth Thursday in November. It has officially been an annual tradition since 1863, when during the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national day of thanksgiving to be celebrated on Thursday, November 26. As a federal and popular holiday in the U.S., Thanksgiving is one of the major holidays of the year. Together with Christmas and the New Year, Thanksgiving is a part of the broader holiday season.
The event that Americans commonly call the "First Thanksgiving" was celebrated to give thanks to God for guiding them safely to the New World. The first Thanksgiving feast lasted three days, providing enough food for 13 Pilgrims and 90 Native Americans. The feast consisted of fish (cod, eels, and bass) and shellfish (clams, lobster, and mussels), wild fowl (ducks, geese, swans, and turkey), venison, berries and fruit, vegetables (peas, pumpkin, beetroot and possibly, wild or cultivated onion), harvest grains (barley and wheat), and the Three Sisters: beans, dried Indian maize or corn, and squash.
On Thanksgiving Day, families and friends usually gather for a large meal or dinner. Consequently, the Thanksgiving holiday weekend is one of the busiest travel periods of the year. Thanksgiving is a four-day or five-day weekend vacation for schools and colleges. Most business and government workers (78% in 2007) are given Thanksgiving and the day after as paid holidays. Thanksgiving Eve, the night before Thanksgiving, is one of the busiest nights of the year for bars and clubs, as many college students and others return to their hometowns to reunite with friends and family.
This year, as the economic noose tightens around the American worker's neck, many people are down-scaling their traditional Thanksgiving Dinner. Keep in mind, comrades, that the missions and churches will be serving free Thanksgiving Dinners. Also, there is the Banquet Turkey TV Dinner. Which can be complimented with a small package of dinner rolls, a can of cranberry sauce, and an individual pumpkin pie - for about $4.00 a pop. Walmart has TV Dinners for 88-cents. A dinner for two can be obtained for five dollars - provided you have some way to heat it up.
No matter how you decide to celebrate Thanksgiving, the main thing is to join together with others to give thanks.
I'd like to take this opportunity to wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving!
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