Thanksgiving

Be grateful for all your blessings as you gather with friends, family

It’s Thanksgiving in America, a day when we take stock of the past year and show our appreciation for all the good things we enjoyed.

At least that’s the general idea.

Mostly, though, it’s a time when families and friends join together to share good times, eat abundantly and then collapse on the sofa in front of the television set for a round of football games.

It’s a ritual that has evolved over the years from what we consider the first Thanksgiving back in 1621, when the Pilgrims and the Wampanoag tribe sat down together at Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts to share a harvest meal that turned into a three-day celebration of plenty.

Strangely enough, it was many years after that first Thanksgiving before the holiday caught on in the U.S.

There were fall harvest festivals and fairs celebrated across the country, but the idea of commemorating the Pilgrims’ Thanksgiving was first promoted by Sara Josepha Hale, editor of Godey’s Lady’s Book, a widely read magazine of the time. She took up the cause of Thanksgiving in 1854 and created a campaign that eventually resulted in President Abraham Lincoln creating a national holiday in 1863.

Though it took more than a century for our formal Thanksgiving to catch on, it has grown into one of the most popular and truly American of holidays. It can be argued that the heart of Thanksgiving—giving thanks for our blessings—has largely been lost in the food, football and fellowship. The same is often said about the commercialization of Christmas.

Maybe so to some extent. But we think there is still plenty of heart and spirit anytime family and friends gather. And we know many Thanksgiving meals begin with thanks to God for the bounty.

Happy Thanksgiving, one and all.