The White Falcon - 23.11.1963, Blaðsíða 3

Saturday, November 23, 1963
WHITE FALCON
3
The History Of
Thanksgiving
A day of days, one of the truly
American holidays, Thanksgiving
is celebrated in every State of the
Union and in the District of
Columbia. We observe this occa-
sion on the last Thursday of every
November. Let’s look a bit at the
beginning of Thanksgiving as a
national observance and some of
the original meanings set up.
Thanksgiving Day, as we have
come to know it as a national
religious festival celebrated on
the same day throughout the
country, dates from 1863. The
credit for bringing this about is
usually given to Mrs. Sarah J.
Hale.
In 1827, Mrs. Hale was editor
of the ‘Ladies’ Magazine’ in.Bos-
ton. During her tenure, she began
to urge the observance of a uni-
form day throughout the country
for the expression of thanks for
the blessings of the year.
She continued her agitation in
a desultory manner until the
‘Ladies’ Magazine’ was consoli-
dated with Godey’s Lady’s Book
of Philadelphia. While editor of
Godey’s her editorials increased
in support of her idea. She also
wrote letters to the governors of
all the states and to the President
and succeeded in persuading many
governors to fix the last Thurs-
day in November as a day of
thanksgiving. Her editorials sup-
plemented her letters and served to
create public sentiment in favor
of the proposed arrangement.
Under her editorship, Godey’s
Lady’s Book had a circulation of
150,000, the largest of any periodi-
cal in the country. Her last edi-
torial on the subject was printed
in the September issue for 1863
and is monumental in subject and
value in her long fight.
Mrs. Hale had written Presi-
dent Lincoln as well as his pre-
decessors, urging the plan upon
him and she undoubtedly sent him
a copy of her last editorial. At
any rate, on October 3, 1863 he
issued the first national Thanks-
giving Proclamation setting apart
the last Thursday in November
as the day to be observed.
Quoting part of that Proclama-
tion issued by President Lincoln,
we find the true meaning of
Thanksgiving. As he was talking
of the many blessings bestowed
on America by God, and the in-
creasing freedom and wealth, he
said, “No human counsel hath
devised these great things. They
are the gracious gifts of the most
high God, who, while dealing with
us in anger for our sins, hath
neverthless remembered mercy.”
Lincoln went on to say, “It has
seemed to me fit and proper that
they should be solemnly, reverently
and gratefully acknowledged as
with one heart and one voice by
the American people. I do, there-
fore, invite my fellow citizens in
every part of the United States,
and also those who are at sea and
those sojourning in foreign lands,
to set apart and observe the last
Thursday of November next as
a day of thanksgiving and praise
to our beneficient Father who
dwelleth in the heavens.”
Lincoln’s words —• written one
hundred years age — hold true to
this day. We, who have so much
to be thankful for, should separate
this day apart from others and
make it one worthy of the words
of this great American.
Let us be thankful for our many
blessings and pray for a peaceful
and better world where all men
can live as brothers.
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Over three centuries ago, our forefathers
in Virginia and Massachusetts, far from
home in a lonely wilderness, set aside a
time of thanksgiving. On the appointed day,
they gave reverent thanks for their safety,
for the health of their children, for the
fertility of their fields, for the love which
bound them together and for the faith which
united them with their God.
So too when the colonies achieved their
independence, our first President in the
first year of his first administration pro-
claimed November 26, 1789, as “a day of
public thanksgiving and prayer to be ob-
served by acknowledging with grateful
hearts the many signal favors of Almighty
God” and called upon the people of the new
republic to “beseech Him to pardon our
national and other transgressions ... to
promote the knowledge and practice of true
religion and virture . . . and generally to
grant unto all mankind such a degree of
temporal prosperity as He alone knows to
be best.”
And so too, in the midst of America’s
tragic Civil War, President Lincoln pro-
claimed the last Thursday of November 1863
as a day to renew our gratitude for Amer-
ica’s “fruitful fields,” for our “national
strength and vigor,” and for all our “sin-
gular deliverances and blessings.”
Much time has passed since the first
colonists came to rocky shores and dark
forests of an unknown continent, much
time since President Washington led a
young people into the experience of nation-
hood, much time since President Lincoln
saw the American nation through the or-
deal of fraternal war—and in these years
our population, our plenty and our power
have grown apace.
Today we are a nation of nearly 200 mil-
lion souls, stretching from coast to coast, on
into the Pacific and north toward the Arc-
tic, a nation enjoying the fruits of an ever-
expanding agriculture and industry and
achieving standards of living unknown in
previous history. We give our humble
thanks for this.
Yet, as our power has grown, so has our
peril. Today we give our thanks, most of
all, for the ideals of honor and faith we
inherit from our forefathers — for the
decency of purpose, steadfastness of resolve
and strength of will, for the courage and
the humility, which they possessed and
which we must seek every day to emulate.
As we express our gratitude, we must never
forget that the highest appreciation is not
to utter words but to live by them.
Let us therefore proclaim our gratitude
to Providence for manifold blessings — let
us be humbly thankful for inherited ideals
— and let us resolve to share those bles-
sings and those ideals with our fellow
human beings throughout the world.
Now, therefore, I, John F. Kennedy,
Presidert of the United States of America,
in consonance with the joint resolution of
the Congress approved December 26, 1941,
designating the fourth Thursday of Novem-
ber in each year as Thanksgiving Day, do
hereby proclaim Thursday, November 28,
1963, as a Day of National Thanksgiving.
On that day let us gather in sanctuaries
dedicated to worship and in homes blessed
by family affection to express our grati-
tude for the glorious gifts of God; and let
us earnestly and humbly pray that He will
continue to guide and sustain us in the
great unfinished tasks of achieving peace,
justice, and understanding among all men
and nations and of ending misery and suf-
fering wherever they exist.