Kirkpatrick speaks on roots of Thanksgiving

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Kirkpatrick speaks on roots of Thanksgiving
Sarah Josepha Hale helps bring about the celebration of Thanksgiving
Courtesy | Collegian

If you’re planning to enjoy turkey, mashed potatoes, and cranberry sauce this Thanksgiving, you can thank President Abraham Lincoln and Sarah Josepha Hale, author and journalist Melanie Kirkpatrick said in a lecture on campus on Tuesday. 

Kirkpatrick is the former deputy editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington, D.C. She is author of four books, including “Thanksgiving: The Holiday at the Heart of the American Experience” and most recently, “Lady Editor: Sarah Josepha Hale and the Making of the Modern American Woman.”

Hale, a widow and mother from New Hampshire, is the reason for Lincoln’s 1863 Thanksgiving proclamation, according to Kirkpatrick.  

“The story of how Thanksgiving became a national holiday is a classic American saga of how one enterprising hardworking individual with a good idea can have an impact in an open democratic society,” Kirkpatrick said. 

Though Hale served as the editor of the most widely circulated magazine of the era and persuaded Lincoln to declare Thanksgiving as a national holiday, Kirkpatrick said Hale is often excluded from history books due to her opposition to women’s suffrage. 

“She was an author, editor, social reformer, and above all, a relentless advocate for the expansion of opportunities for women,” Kirkpatrick said, “especially in the realm of education and the professions.” 

In 1828, when Hale began her editorial career, Kirkpatrick said roughly half of American women were illiterate. She campaigned for women to be able to teach in public schools and the establishment of universities for institutions of higher education for women. She used her patriotic magazine, Godey’s Lady’s Book, as a platform to campaign for Thanksgiving’s inauguration. 

“Thanksgiving reflected what she saw as the generous spirit of the American people, and she encouraged leaders to remember the needy on Thanksgiving Day,” Kirkpatrick said. “Hale helped create popular support for the holiday by publishing fiction and poets set around Thanksgiving Day.”

Hale published recipes for popular Thanksgiving dishes. But Kirkpatrick said above all, she valued Thanksgiving for its “deep moral influence on America’s national character.”

“She believed a national celebration of Thanksgiving Day would help preserve the Union,” Kirkpatrick said. 

Lincoln inaugurated Thanksgiving as a national holiday in 1863, but the first Thanksgiving feast took place in Plymouth, Massachusetts, 242 years earlier in 1621. Throughout the 17th century, English settlers to New England held days to give thanks to God for their blessings, such as much needed rainfall and victories in the Revolutionary War, Kirkpatrick said. 

During the early years of the Civil War, Lincoln as well as Jefferson Davis, president of the confederacy, appointed days of thanks to celebrate wartime victories. 

“The Thanksgiving proclamations issued both by Jefferson Davis and Lincoln were non-sectarian, inclusive of Americans of all religions,” Kirkpatrick said. “They made reference to God, but they were not christianized. This is an important point because it reflects the attitude of our Founding Fathers and later toward religion in American history. People of all faiths were welcome.”

By the time of Lincoln’s presidency, each state had a different Thanksgiving tradition, Kirkpatrick said. In Michigan, Gov. Lewis Cass proclaimed the territory’s first Thanksgiving, eight years before it became a state.

“There was an amusing saying that if you plan your travel itinerary carefully, you could enjoy a Thanksgiving dinner every week between Election Day and Christmas,” Kirkpatrick said.

Lincoln declared a day of thanks for the North’s victory at Gettysburg. Two months later, he surprised the nation by declaring a day of thanks for the whole nation on the last Thursday in November.

“In his proclamation, Lincoln catalogued the blessings for which all Americans could be grateful: peace with foreign nations, expanding borders, growing population, and farms, minds and industry that were producing well,” Kirkpatrick said. “He was asking Americans in the North and the South to look beyond the current horrors to a better day when the country is ‘permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.”

After Lincoln’s death, Hale continued campaigning for the national celebration of Thanksgiving. But a presidential proclamation did not have the force of law outside D.C., Kirkpatrick said.

“For that it would need an act of Congress, and the country would have to wait until 1941 when Congress finally took action passing a resolution naming the fourth Thursday of November as the permanent date of the national holiday of Thanksgiving,” Kirkpatrick said.

President Franklin Roosevelt signed the resolution in 1942, and Americans have celebrated Thanksgiving as a national holiday ever since.

Kirkpatrick quoted Lincoln’s inaugural Thanksgiving address to conclude her speech.

“It is seemed to me fit and proper that our nation’s blessings should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged, as with one heart, and one voice by the whole American republic, with one heart and one voice,” Lincoln said.

Junior Haley Strack, who introduced Kirkpatrick, said this message of unity and gratitude is fitting in today’s polarized society. 

“Kirkpatrick’s knowledge and passion for American patriotism couldn’t have been more timely,” Strack said. “In a culture of division, her understanding of the American spirit reminded me how important it is to give thanks for freedom and unity.”

Strack said as a woman in journalism, she was inspired by hearing Hale’s story of bravery and sacrifice in the face of pressure.

“Melanie Kirkpatrick’s work offers a really interesting look on how one woman, Sarah Hale, affected how the United States celebrated Thanksgiving,” Assistant Professor of History Miles Smith said. “Kirkpatrick’s fascinating talk made me want to read the book, which I’ve already bought, in time for the holiday.”