Give Thanks

Since we're hosting an American Thanksgiving dinner for our neighbors and friends, I decided it might be a good idea to refresh my memory as to why we celebrate this holiday. I mean besides it being the day before Black Friday, of course.

Black Friday . . .

has traditionally been pegged as the biggest shopping day of the year since 2005 and the term "Black Friday" is now defined as the day when retailers begin to profit and are "in the black". The term, as it is used today, actually originated in Philadelphia in 1966 and was used to describe traffic jams and mobs of shoppers. Way back in 1869, the term was also used to describe a financial crisis in the U. S.

Anyway, happy shopping if you're one of the brave.

Thanksgiving in the U. S. has been celebrated on different dates, often determined by each state, but the first Thanksgiving when all Americans celebrated on the same day was in 1863. President Lincoln declared the final Thursday of November as Thanksgiving. It was in 1941 that the date was changed to the fourth (not always final) Thursday of November and became a national holiday.

Did you know other countries celebrate Thanksgiving too?

Canada - 2nd Monday of October

Liberia (that's in West Africa) - 1st Thursday of November

Norfolk Island (that's in Australia) - Last Wednesday of November

Grenada (that's an island in the West Indies - Caribbean Sea) - October 25

None of these on the same day as America. Well, except one other . . . more on that later.

The American holiday all began in 1621 at Plymouth (aka Massachusetts) or maybe it was 1565 in Florida or perhaps it was 1619 in Virginia. There are several declared origins, but the Pilgrims celebrating a good harvest helped by the Native Americans who provided seeds as well as teaching them to fish is usually the favorite. Of course that's a couple hundred years before we decided to take their land and kill them.

Here's an interesting theory on how it all got started . . . many of the Pilgrims who migrated to Plymouth had resided in the city of Leiden in the Netherlands. It is thought they may have been influenced by the annual Thanksgiving services for the relief of the Siege of Leiden in 1574 while they were staying in Leiden.

Briefly, the Seige of Leiden was during the Eighty Years War when the Spanish tried to capture the rebellious city of Leiden, but failed.

To this day, the church in Leiden, Pieterskerk, commemorates the hospitality the Pilgrims received in Leiden with a Thanksgiving Day service on the American Thanksgiving Day. So that's the other country that celebrates on the same day as us.

Leiden, Netherlands - Last Thursday of November

Leiden, Netherlands is about 2 hours north of where we live. We've never been there, but I found this picture on the internet. Looks like a nice place.

Happy Thanksgiving, Pilgrim! We do have so much to be thankful for.