Thanksgiving is truly an American tradition. I was listening to a program last night, and it was brought to my attention how little our society today really knows about Thanksgiving and why we have this special day of thanks. It seems that most people feel it is for eating and watching football, which are all part of what we do today. The true reason for the holiday is rooted deep in American history and should not be forgotten by the American people. My people were well rooted in America when this Holdiay became a recognized as a National Day of Celebration.
https://www.history.com/news/thanksgiving-timeline
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thanksgiving_(United_States)
and here is what I found.
There’s no holiday that’s more quintessentially American than Thanksgiving.
In 1541, the Spanish explorer Francisco Vasquez de Coronado
accompanied by 1500 armored men left Mexico City and marched north in search of
gold. They camped in Palo Duro Canyon and their priest Juan de Padilla called
for a feast of prayer and thanksgiving.
In 1598, in a second Texas town a wealthy Spanish dignitary
Juan de Oñate
was granted land among the pueblo Indians as he blazed a path across the
Chihuahau Desert. After 10 days of rest near San Elizario, Texas, Oñate
ordered a feast of thanksgiving. "We built a great bonfire and roasted the
meat and fish, and then all sat down to a repast the like of which we had never
enjoyed before…We were happy that our trials were over; as happy as were the
passengers in the Ark when they saw the dove returning with the olive branch in
his beak, bringing tidings that the deluge had subsided."
In 1607, English colonists at Fort St. George assemble for a
harvest feast and prayer meeting with the Abenaki Indians in Maine.
In 1621: The Plymouth Feast. Archive evidence comes from a letter
from Plymouth colonist Edward Winslow that the colonists wanted to celebrate
their first good crop of corn and barley grown with generous assistance from
the native Wampanoag Indians. So the English colonists sent out four men to
kill “as much fowl” as they could in one day, and invited King Massasoit and 90
of his men “so we might after a more special manner rejoice together.” The king
brought five deer to the three-day party, which 19th-century New Englanders
would later promote as the origin of modern Thanksgiving.
William Bradford, in “Of Plymouth Plantation” documents much
about this harvest that became the first Thanksgiving.
