The Thanksgiving traditions have been with use since 1621 and many of our expectations of the holiday trace back to certain events of those days. It is still a time for family and friends and a time to look back and be thankful for what we have.
The Thanksgiving meal as we have come to expect was not like the first meal. Turkey was not served and the meal was basic food; what could be found and hunted for in days. But the idea of sharing a meal with friends and family has continued and fact and fiction of the first Thanksgiving meal has grown over the years.
I think as I look at Thanksgiving it’s a time to share and appreciate what the year has offered us. The traditional special plates what each family member makes only adds to the feeling of home
This in an excerpt from a story written by Elaine G Cole and published in the Jamestown Post Journal, Monday November 19. Jamestown is only 7 miles from my home and the story and mention of the Amish who live in this area triggered memories for me. Enjoy the article
A look At Yesteryear Thanksgiving Celebrations By Elaine G. Cole
It’s doubtful that any family will travel by horse and sleigh on Thanksgiving Day 2007 unless it is an Amish family. Nor will they pass through drifted snow in the woods as author Marie Fairchild did in the 1800s when she wrote ‘‘The New-England Boy’s Song about Thanksgiving Day.’’ That mode, however, was the way of distance traveling for most people in yesteryear.
The pilgrims who are credited with celebrating the first Thanksgiving in 1621 — though not called by that name — did not travel to the celebration for they all lived in the Plymouth settlement. The Wampanoag Indians that joined them probably did. They walked or rode horseback to that harvest festivity that was declared by Gov. William Bradford.
Two years later, after suffering great hardships, famine, epidemics and harsh New England winters, Bradford made another proclamation stating, ‘‘In as much as the Great Father (God) has given us this year an abundant harvest of Indian corn, wheat, beans, squash and garden vegetables, and has made the forest too abound with game and the sea with fish and clams, and in as much as He has protected us from the ravages of the savages, has spared us from pestilence and disease, has granted us freedom to worship God according to the dictates of our own conscience. Now, I your magistrate, do proclaim that all ye pilgrims with your wives and ye little ones, do gather at ye meeting house on ye hill between the hours of 9 and 12 in the day time on Thursday, November ye 29th, of the year of our Lord one thousand, six hundred and twenty-three, the third year since ye pilgrims landed on ye pilgrim rock, there to listen to ye pastor and render thanksgiving to ye Almighty God for all His blessings.’’
The pilgrims celebrated that day with feasting. According to the 1621 journal of Albert Winslow, a Mayflower pilgrim, four pilgrims were sent ‘‘fowling’’ for wild birds for the feast. In one day of hunting, they bagged enough to feed the Plymouth colony for a week. After three days of feasting to celebrate their harvest, a band of Indians under Chief Massasoit ‘‘went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed upon our governor, and upon the captain and others.
To read the rest of the story; http://post-journal.com/articles.asp?articleID=21917
Happy Thanksgiving all! Denise
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