Todays Trivia Fact: While the first unofficial Thanksgiving in America was held by the Puritans in 1621 to celebrate the harvest, the first Thanksgiving in the New World was held in Canada by Martin Frobisher to celebrate surviving the voyage from England through storms and icebergs while he was attempting to find a northern passage to the Pacific Ocean. The first official Thanksgiving in the United States was held on November 26, 1789, when President George Washington declared it to be a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favours of Almighty God. President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed it to be a national holiday in 1863 at the urging of Sarah Josepha Hale who wrote letters to politicians for about 40 years trying to make it a holiday. Lincoln proclaimed that Thanksgiving would be held on the last Thursday in November and it remained so until December 26, 1941, when President Franklin Roosevelt signed a joint resolution of Congress changing it to the fourth Thursday of November. The tradition of the President pardoning a turkey each Thanksgiving was started by President George H.W. Bush in 1989, though the first President on record as issuing a pardon to a turkey was Ronald Reagan who did it as a joke in response to a question on whether he would pardon Oliver North in the Iran-Contra Affair. Now that you have had your fill of Thanksgiving trivia, enjoy your Thanksgiving and your turkey (unless youve pardoned it).
Posted on: Thu, 27 Nov 2014 08:24:15 +0000
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