You may have heard of Sarah Josepha Hale, the Mother of Thanksgiving. If you haven’t, she was a widowed mother of five, editor of the magazine Godey’s Lady’s Book, and the reason we have a national day of Thanksgiving. In 1863, President Lincoln issued the national proclamation giving us our American feast. A children’s book even has the title Thank you, Sarah: The Woman Who Saved Thanksgiving.
But who was Sarah Hale? For one, she was a complicated figure, a woman who opposed giving women the right to vote, but who lobbied for Thanksgiving as a particularly American and feminine holiday. I look at Hale’s life, as well as an article by the historian Anne Wills, to discuss the 19th century foundations of this holiday. It turns out, Pilgrims had less to do with Thanksgiving than did 19th century magazines. Perhaps elementary school students should be dressing up as periodicals rather than as Pilgrims.
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