American as Pumpkin Pie: A History of Thanksgiving
When we sit down to Thanksgiving dinner, we think we know what we’re commemorating. But if an actual Pilgrim were to attend your Thanksgiving, chances are he’d be stunned by what he saw there. In this episode, historian James McWilliams discusses why the Puritans would have turned up their noses at our “traditional” Thanksgiving foods. Religion scholar Anne Blue Wills reveals the Victorian origins of our modern holiday, and one woman’s campaign to fix it on the national calendar. An archeologist at Colonial Williamsburg explains what garbage has to tell us about early American diets. And legendary NFL quarterback Roger Staubach describes what it was like to spend every turkey day on the football field.
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Full Transcript
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Show Highlights
Sarah Hale: The Mother of Thanksgiving
Historian Anne Blue Wills tells the story of Sarah Josepha Hale, a New England magazine editor who campaigned tirelessly to put Thanksgiving on our national calendar.
View an audio slide show of “The Mother of Thanksgiving.” See images of Godey’s Lady’s Book, presidential Thanksgiving Day proclamations, and penitant puritans. Be sure and click on “Captions” in the lower right corner of the viewer.
View an audio slide show of “Turkeys and Touchdowns: An Interview with Roger Staubach.” See historical images of Americans playing football and hear Staubach, former quarterback for the Dallas Cowboys, dish on turkeys and pigskin.
No, Thanks!
Historian James McWilliams tells 18th Century History Guy Peter Onuf why the Pilgrims and Indians would probably have been grossed out by each other’s contributions to the Thanksgiving table.
Related Links:
- Learn more about Thanksgiving turkey pardons.
- Read up on the Pilgrims’ struggles with New World agriculture.
- View Anne Blue Wills’ article on Pilgrims and progress.
- Discover the domestic roots of Thanksgiving.
- Consider the importance of Thanksgiving realities versus traditions.
- Browse a wide variety of Thanksgiving history articles.
- Compare competing “first Thanksgivings” in Virginia, Texas, and Florida.
- Read a translation of an Iroquois prayer of thanksgiving.
- Appreciate 500 years of Thanksgiving history with this timeline.
- Listen to “real” Pilgrims answer questions about their 1621 thanksgiving.
- Watch an online documentary about Sarah Hale.
Primary Sources:
All Centuries
- Recollections of Thanksgiving, from the frontier to New York City
- Presidential Thanksgiving proclamations: typescripts and original documents
- A set of primary source materials from the Library of Congress
18th Century
- Firsthand accounts of the Plymouth thanksgiving: Edward Winslow and William Bradford
19th Century
- Sarah Hale’s letter to Abraham Lincoln and her editorials penned in Godey’s Lady’s Book
- Domestic manuals by Sarah Hale: Receipts for the Million, Modern Household Cookery, Lessons from Women’s Lives, Traits of American Life (includes a chapter on “The Thanksgiving of the Heart”), and The Good Housekeeper
- “The Soldier’s Thanksgiving,” a poem included in care packages to Union fighters during the Civil War
20th Century
- “A Day of Thanksgiving,” a patriotic film from 1951, explores one family’s response to lean times
- The American Can Company presents “The Miracle of the Can,” ca. 1956
- “Poultry on the Farm,” an educational film from 1937
15 Responses
Trackbacks & Pingbacks
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BackStory: Vets and Thanksgiving « Teaching American History in SW Washington :
[...] American as Pumpkin Pie: A History of Thanksgiving [...]
Quote -- November 24, 2008 @ 5:53 pm -
The REAL story of Thanksgiving « The Do It Yourself Scholar :
[...] out American as Pumpkin Pie: A History of Thanksgiving (website, iTunes), a recent episode of the podcast BackStory – With the American History Guys. There [...]
Quote -- November 24, 2008 @ 9:21 pm -
Other Side of the Glass: BackStory — The Mediavore :
[...] This week’s program is all about Thanksgiving, and is available online. [...]
Quote -- November 26, 2008 @ 2:20 pm -
Talking Turkey (and Pumpkin Pie) « JSRCC Library Blog :
[...] Turkey (and Pumpkin Pie) Listen to the full story of this most American of holidays on “BackStorywith the American History Guys”! You can browse more fascinating U.S. History topics using one of the library’s research [...]
Quote -- November 18, 2009 @ 8:58 am
Does a common Thanksgiving-historical-mythology really even exist? Historians seem to assume that Americans share, and believe to varying degrees, a collection of myths about American history. But at least as concerns Thanksgiving, doesn’t popular culture divorce the holiday from any hint of history/mythology? Is there any myth out there in need of busting?
QuoteWould you consider Indians and Pilgrims sitting down to a big feast in a spirit of brotherly love a myth? The relationship between native peoples and the settlers is nowhere represented as strongly as that image of the Thanksgiving table. Surely that would qualify as a selective interpretation if not an outright myth.
QuoteThe FIRST OFFICIAL Thanksgiving
Charlestown, Massachusetts
June 29, 1676
The 1621 feast between the Pilgrims and the Indians was not the first official Thanksgiving. On June 20, 1676, following the massacre over King Philip and 700-800 Pequot Indians in Connecticut, the council of Charlestown, Massachusetts unanimously voted to proclaim June 29. 1676, as a day of celebration and Thanksgiving. The following statement was read:
“The Holy God having by a long and Continual Series of his Afflictive dispensations in and by the present Warr with the Heathen Natives of this land, written and brought to pass bitter things against his own Covenant people in this wilderness, yet so that we evidently discern that in the midst of his judgments he hath remembered mercy, having remembered his Footstool in the day of his sore displeasure against us for our sins, with many singular Intimations of his Fatherly Compassion, and regard; reserving many of our Towns from Desolation Threatened, and attempted by the Enemy, and giving us especially of late with many of our Confederates many signal Advantages against them, without such Disadvantage to ourselves as formerly we have been sensible of, if it be the Lord’s mercy that we are not consumed, It certainly bespeaks our positive our positive Thankfulness, when our Enemies are in any measure disappointed or destroyed; and fearing the Lord should take notice under so many Intimations of his returning mercy, we should be found an Insensible people, as not standing before Him with Thanksgiving, as well as lading him with our Complaints in the time of pressing Afflictions.”ulness, when our Enemies are in any measure disappointed or destroyed; and fearing the Lord should take notice under so many Intimations of his returning mercy, we should be found an Insensible people, as not standing before
QuoteThis is one of those national myths that is very close to the facts. It was a harvest celebration in Plymouth in the fall of 1621, which was probably not all that different from such celebrations traditionally held by most cultures — which is why when the Wampanoags showed up they understood and participated in the event. As reported by Nathaniel Morton in a letter to a friend in England . . .
“Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruit of our labors. They four in one day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the company almost a week. At which time, amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation and bestowed on our governor, and upon the captain and others.”
Turkeys? Perhaps. But clearly deer was feasted on for those three days. And the Natives and the newcomers did get along and hang out together. Unfortunately, this spirit of friendship didn’t last. Oh, and those 90 Wampanoag warriors vastly outnumbered the Englishmen left alive in Plymouth (not to mention those still sick and barely able to stand), so it’s not too surprising that the settlers told the Massasoit that it was fine if they celebrated together.
QuoteWhat about the 1619 (if my memory recalls the proper date) celebration in Virginia, which I believe was mandated by The Virginia Company in instructions to the colonists?
QuoteSurely the American holiday of Thanksgiving simply has its roots in the Harvest or Thanksgiving service that occurs in the autumn in most Anglican churches, intertwined with foundational myths of racial harmony (which we however would like to be true) and served with a dollop of Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade?
?
I know it’s much more complicated than I’m making out…looking forward to hearing the program. It’ll be my only Thanksgiving Day treat now that I’ve moved to Singapore, so bring it on History Guys!!
QuoteMassachusetts may claim the first official Thanksgiving, but the Continental Congress, after being driven out of Philadelphia by the British, and while Washington and the Continental Army were holed up at Valley Forge, were quite thankful for the results of the Battle(s) of Saratoga, and subsequently enacted the first national Thanksgiving proclamation from (my hometown) York, Pennsylvania.
Picture of historical marker:
http://www.hmdb.org/marker.asp?marker=4549
Inscription:
The First National Thanksgiving
QuoteWas proclaimed from York by the Continental Congress on November 1, 1777 to be celebrated on Thursday, December 18. It was written by Sam Adams of Massachusetts. “The Father of the Revolution,” who advocated for the first time “one day of public thanksgiving” for all of the states after the battle of Saratoga. “That with one heart and one voice the good people may express the grateful feelings of their hearts.”
And don’t forget the Fantasticals — they make it really interesting. Were they really led by cross-dressers? Why did kids trick or treat for Thanksgiving in New York on Thanksgiving before it was moved to Halloween? I’ve wanted to know more . . . !
QuoteArrrrrgh……. The Thanksgiving stories are still overpowered by the New England lobby. The ink is hardly dry on the celebration of 400 years of English America — Jamestowne for you NE folks, and we are off again on how Thanksgiving comes from New England. And come on, the FIRST Thanksgiving in 1676 in New England???!!!!! I go along with bumper sticker which came a few years ago out shortly after scientists decided PLUTO was no longer a planet. “Honk if you think Pluto is still a planet.” I say “Honk, if you think the first REAL thanksgiving was at Jamestowne!!!!!!!”
On a more serious note, I think the idea for this website, or whatever it is, it just terrific. For all too long, there has apparently been an unwritten rule of historians, that there must be pain associated with teaching, learning, and sharing history. I say more power to the guys and gals who have created this romp.
Chawnzmit – The Trumpeter of Jamestowne
QuotePresident John F. Kennedy officially recognized the first Thanksgiving as occurring in 1619 at Berkeley Plantation in Charles City County, Virginia. The evidence was recognized as such by historian Arthur Schlesinger. This Pilgrim/Northeast-centric claim is 2 years later than the Berkeley event.
But, what they hey, why let the truth stand in the way of persistent public inculcation.
QuoteAnybody know the title and artist of the reggae song at the outro of this Thanksgiving program? “Thank you Lord, for watching over me…. Thank you Lord, for what you’ve done for me… Thank you Lord, etc., etc.”
Quote