Talmage Boston on the History of Thanksgiving
Talmage Boston, presidential historian and author of How the Best Did It: Leadership Lessons from Our Top Presidents, joins the No Spin News to discuss how Thanksgiving became an annual national tradition during Lincoln’s presidency.
Here are the key points:
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Early Attempts: Before Lincoln, presidents like George Washington, John Adams, and James Madison proclaimed national days of Thanksgiving, but they were not established as an annual tradition.
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Sarah Josepha Hale’s Campaign: Beginning in the 1840s, Sarah Josepha Hale, a prominent editor (and author of “Mary Had a Little Lamb”), campaigned persistently for an annual national Thanksgiving holiday, promoting the family-centered, celebratory vision we know today.
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Lincoln Formalized It: In 1863, during the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln finally agreed to Hale’s proposal, making Thanksgiving an annual national tradition, which has continued every year since.
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Lincoln’s Motivation: Despite the ongoing war, Lincoln saw reasons for gratitude due to Union victories (Gettysburg and Vicksburg) and the manpower surge resulting from the Emancipation Proclamation, aligning with his own spiritual view of ending slavery as the “great national sin.”
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FDR Set the Date: The holiday’s official date was not permanently fixed until President Franklin D. Roosevelt formalized it in 1941 (after experimenting with 1939-1941) as the fourth Thursday in November.
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FDR’s Motivation: Unlike Lincoln’s spiritual focus, Roosevelt’s primary goal was economic—to ensure a longer Christmas shopping season to boost the economy during the Great Depression/World War II era.
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