History of Thanksgiving

The History of Thanksgiving

The tradition of placing turkey at the center of the Thanksgiving dinner  is deeply-entrenched today, but it was one that was slow to take hold, and set in stone only in more recent history – thanks in part to the immense advertising efforts of the American poultry industry.

Using the turkey as a symbol of the Thanksgiving meal is as contrived as the notion that the holiday was initiated to celebrate the Pilgrims' good fortune after landing at Plymouth Rock. It is far from conclusive that turkey was even consumed at the 1621 feast, which, according to the only two known, first-hand accounts of the feast, featured "many fowle and five deere." Turkeys are never specifically mentioned in these accounts, and another such celebration feast would not be seen in the colonies for at least 50 years.

When our forefathers began the work of establishing a holiday centered on the giving of thanks, a consensus among them was hard to come by. The first official, presidential announcement of the formation of such a holiday came in 1789 from George Washington, who put aside a day on October 2 to celebrate the Constitution more than 150 years after the Pilgrim's fall feast. In 1798, President John Adams designated May 9 as "a time for fervent thanksgiving." Thomas Jefferson, on the other hand, opposed the idea of a thanks-giving day, because he considered proclaiming holidays to be "a monarchical practice." Subsequently, another U.S. thanks-giving celebration was not observed for the next 60 years.

Thanks in large part to the efforts of Sara Josepha Hale, an editor of a popular women's magazine, the holiday was revived in 1863. Every fall, she published endless editorials and recipes (most featuring turkey) in her magazine and wrote hundreds of letters advocating for the establishment of a Thanksgiving holiday. In an 1861 plea to President Abraham Lincoln, she wrote of the importance of a day to "lay aside our enmities on this one day and join in a Thanksgiving Day of peace."

In 1863, after more than 30 years of lobbying, Sara Josepha Hale had her wish granted when Abraham Lincoln declared Thanksgiving a national holiday. According to University of Michigan anthropology professor Richard Ford, at that time, ". . . there were many different foods that could be served and it is from this time period that our typical dinner foods derive." In 1896, the first edition of Fannie Farmer's Boston Cooking-School Cook Book recommended that the day be celebrated with foods symbolic of the "Pilgrim."

According to historical accounts, during this time period, before the invention of the icebox, farmers usually killed their turkey flock in the fall, because cool weather better staved off the natural decomposition of the animals’ flesh. The fact that the Christmas and Thanksgiving holidays coincided with this time of year  may have facilitated the push for turkey consumption for Thanksgiving feasts.

The turkey, however, was not widely-accepted as the quintessential Thanksgiving dish until the mid-20th century. Apparently, many housewives preparing a turkey struggled with "pinning" the bird – the act of removing the tiny pin feathers from the dark-skinned carcass. Hence, to make the affair less arduous and more appealing to consumers, the Beltsville White was bred and perfected in 1947. The Beltsville White was the culmination of a breeding program, launched by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) at the behest of the National Turkey Federation, to produce a bird with a more aesthetically-pleasing carcass.

In 1947, the National Turkey Federation's annual presentation of a turkey to the standing U.S. president also began. The presentation, coupled with the introduction of the new, light-skinned Beltsville White, caused turkey consumption in the U.S. to take off. Between 1950 and 1960, turkey consumption at least doubled, and consumption has continued to rise almost every year since. Today, consumers consume an average of 17.5 pounds of turkeys per person, up dramatically from the less than three pounds consumed per person, per year prior to 1940, before the launch of the National Turkey Federation's concerted promotional efforts.