Naughty Nicole: The History of Thanksgiving

On Today’s episode of The World In My Eyes we’re exploring another wondrous time of year! That’s right boys and girls… today I’m going to share with you all the wonder and excitement of one of my favorite holidays, well one of my favorite food holidays! Most of us – well us Americans – grew up learning all about the First Thanksgiving and most of us remember the story and God-awful plays we were forced to endure – both as children and now as adults – that tells the tale of that fateful winter. Now the basic story goes something like this – and I am paraphrasing, but the Pilgrims came over on the Mayflower and the Indians who were already in this country took a shine to the group and taught them how to cultivate the land and more importantly, how to grow food, and because of this gesture of kindness, the Pilgrims decided to have a feast and invite the Indians. And this is what every American school-child learns as how Thanksgiving came about. A sweet story about different people coming together in tolerance and friendship to celebrate the fall harvest… too bad it’s all bulls**t.

Most stories of Thanksgiving start with the harvest celebration of the pilgrims and the Native Americans that took place in the autumn of 1621, and although they did have a three-day feast in celebration of a good harvest, and the local natives did participate, this “first thanksgiving” was simply a gathering. In fact, there is little evidence that this feast of thanks led directly to our modern Thanksgiving Day holiday. So let’s talk about the Real History of Thanksgiving and give you the non-kid-friendly version of what really happened. So our story begins in 1614 when a band of English explorers sailed home to England with a ship full of Patuxet (or better known as the Pawtucket) Indians bound for slavery. They left behind smallpox which virtually wiped out those who had escaped.

Music:Firesong Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com): Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License