Next to Christmas, Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday, as it was one of the few times of year my extended family (25+ aunts, uncles, and cousins) got together in the spirit of fellowship.
The family has shrunk some over the years: My beloved grandparents, my father, my uncle Steve, and my cousin Jon have all passed on, while other members became estranged.
But new members have also been added, including nearly a half-dozen kids born over the last 10 years.
So we still look forward to our annual Thanksgiving gatherings, from watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade to savoring my favorite dish, a pecan-crusted sweet potato soufflé.
So we thought it’d be fun to learn 30 fascinating facts about Thanksgiving history & traditions, tracing its evolution from ancient harvest festivals to the holiday of gratitude we know and love today!
READ MORE: 20 Ways to Celebrate Christmas in the Blue Ridge Mountains
Thanksgiving History & Traditions Guide
- Ancient History of Thanksgiving
- American Thanksgiving History
- Fun Facts About Thanksgiving
- Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade History
READ MORE: Inside the Biltmore House Christmas in Asheville NC
Ancient History of Thanksgiving Traditions
1. The idea of an annual harvest celebration dates back to ancient Greece. The 3-day autumn festival known as Thesmophoria was celebrated to honor the Goddess Demeter, the deity of food grains.
2. Fertile married women would build a home for Demeter to stay in the first day, purified their bodies and souls by keeping a fast on the second day, and on the third day prepared a great feast including seasonal fruits, plump pigs, corn delicacies, and yummy cakes.
3. The cornucopia symbol dates back to the ancient Greeks and Romans. The idea of a horn-shaped basket filled with fruit, flowers and other goodies comes from the Latin cornu copiae, which literally means “horn of plenty.”
4. In Greek mythology, the cornucopia was an enchanted severed goat’s horn, created by Zeus to produce a never-ending supply of whatever the owner desires. Think of it as an unsexy genie, without the “3 Wishes” limitations.
5. The given name of the turkey comes from the Middle Eastern country, from which they were imported to America. But archaeological evidence shows that these birds roamed across the Americas some 10 million years ago.
6. Known in their native language as huexoloti, wild turkey was an important traditional food source for the Aztecs.
7. Their domesticated cousins became popular among the early English settlers in America, partly due to their appetite for the pests that preyed on tobacco plants.
8. When the Spanish invaders took the bird back to market in Spain, traders took the bird into what was then the world’s most powerful empire, the Ottoman Empire (Turkey). There, the bird was bred to become plumper, like the turkey most of us eat on Thanksgiving today.
READ MORE: The 30 Best NC Christmas Events
American Thanksgiving History
9. Though the 1621 shindig between the Pilgrims and Native Americans is widely accepted as “the first Thanksgiving,” some historians believe the first American Thanksgiving took place upon Juan Ponce De Leon’s landing in Florida in 1513, or perhaps Francisco Vásquez de Coronado’s service of Thanksgiving in the Texas Panhandle in 1541.
10. There are also two claims re: Thanksgiving observances taking place in Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607 and 1610.
11. What most people think of as “the first Thanksgiving”– the famed 1621 meal between the British settlers and the indigenous Wampanoag– was actually a 3-day celebration. While turkey may have been among the many dishes on the menu, it was not the meal’s centerpiece.
12. The hospitable Native Americans welcomed the English immigrants with venison (five deer in total), corn, and oysters, which were staples of the Wampanoag diet.
13. America’s first President, George Washington, revived the holiday tradition in America by designating special days for a National Thanksgiving.
14. As Revolutionary War veterans died off, the Thanksgiving tradition was lost in America for a number of years until President Abraham Lincoln declared Thanksgiving a national holiday, to be held the last Thursday in November of 1863 (during the height of the Civil War).
15. For almost 80 years, Thanksgiving was simply a tradition in the United States. It didn’t officially become a national holiday in 1941, when the U.S. Congress passed legislation signed by President Franklin Roosevelt.
READ MORE: 10 Festive Things to Do for Christmas in Richmond VA
Fun Facts About Thanksgiving Traditions
16. Writer/editor Sarah Joseph Hale is best known for composing the classic children’s song, “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” But she should also be known as the woman who saved Thanksgiving! She wrote numerous articles and letters to Lincoln about the significance of the holiday.
17. Pilgrims are typically portrayed in stark black and white clothing, with big buckles and hats. But buckles didn’t come into fashion until the late 17th century, and pilgrims primarily wore their black-and-white clothes to church on Sunday.
18. In reality, pilgrim women typically dressed in colors such as red, green, brown, violet, blue or gray, while men often wore white, beige, black, green and brown.
19. One of the strangest Thanksgiving traditions is the presidential pardon of one fortunate fowl. President George H.W. Bush was the first to do so in 1989, and the annual custom is still upheld today!
20. Pardoned turkeys have had some weird adventures. The 2005 & 2009 turkeys were Grand Marshal in Thanksgiving Day parades at Disneyland and Disney World, while the 2010-2013 turkeys got a vacation to Washington’s Mount Vernon Estate (now a living history museum)!
21. Did you know that a holiday-related screw-up led to the creation of TV dinners? In 1953, a Swanson employee accidentally ordered 260 TONS of turkey! Savvy sales rep Gerry Thomas suggested filling aluminum trays with turkey, dressing, peas, and sweet potatoes to create an easy-to-heat meal. The first TV dinners cost just 98¢, and sold 10+ million in the first year!
READ MORE: Christmas in Chattanooga TN: 10 Festive Events Worth Attending
Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade History
22. The annual holiday event many of us grew up watching every Thanksgiving morning was originally known as the Macy’s Christmas Parade.
23. The parade debuted in 1924 as a promotional Christmas gimmick to celebrate the expansion of Macy’s flagship store in Manhattan. Covering an entire city block on 34th Street, between 6th and 7th Avenue, it became the self-proclaimed “World’s Largest Store.”
24. The first Macy’s Parade was very small, with no character balloons, a few floats, and most of the participants were Macy’s employees. But there were animals from the Central Park Zoo (bears, elephants, donkeys) and marching bands, making it resemble a circus parade.
25. If you’re among the 28+ million people who love watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade on TV every year, thank Tony Sarg. The children’s book illustrator/puppeteer designed the giant balloons used in the 1927 Macy’s Parade, which included a “human behemoth,” dinosaur, dachshund, and Felix The Cat.
26. Sarg is also credited with creating the first mechanically animated Christmas window displays that grace Macy’s Manhattan storefront throughout the holiday season.
27. Not everyone loved the Macy’s parade at first. The “Allied Patriotic Societies” protested, arguing that the commercial event would interfere with Thanksgiving Day worship. They asked the NYC police commissioner to revoke the parade permit, but he declined to do so.
28. The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade was held annually every year until World War II, when it was cancelled from 1942 to 1944 due to helium and rubber shortages in the US.
29. For several years, Macy’s simply released the balloons (which now cost around $200,000 to make and nearly $100,000 a year to maintain) into the air after the parade ended.
30. Starting in 1928, there was a race to recover them, because the company offered a $100 reward. Tug-of-war fights broke out (the first Black Friday, perhaps?), and the practice was ended in 1932 after a student pilot nearly crashed her plane in an effort to retrieve a balloon in mid-air! –by Bret Love & Mary Gabbett
