Thursday, November 27, 2014

Thanksgiving


The American holiday of Thanksgiving has its origins in the celebration of a successful harvest by
the Puritans -- the first permanent European settlers in New England -- after many deaths on the trip to America, a difficult first year and a summer drought.  There may or may not have been a communal dinner.  The settlers may or may not have invited the local natives to join them.

There is no record that the Puritans lined up at midnight to go shopping.  Few of them played or watched football.  And I am pretty sure that no Puritans put up Christmas decorations three weeks before Thanksgiving.  (But I hope they had turkey, cranberry sauce and pies.)

Happy Thanksgiving to my American friends.

17 comments:

John "By Stargoose And Hanglands" said...

They were probably thankful though. Thankful for a lot of things that we now take for granted.

Luis Gomez said...

Have a beautiful one Jack.

Susie said...

Happy Thanksgiving dad:)

Tanya Breese said...

you don't think they went black friday shopping? ;) beautiful flowers! happy thanksgiving!

Kate said...

Jack, In addition to your historical facts, I always thought that the feast provided the Puritans was the first welfare dinner from the Native food shelf. Hope that they were thankful, as many of us are for our privileges!! May you enjoy the day. Gosh! Only 3 NFL games today!!

Birdman said...

I'm so confused now about the 'true' story.
Happy Turkey Day!

Karl said...

Beautiful composition with fine colors!
Happy Thanksgiving, Jack.

Ed said...

Happy Thanksgiving!

Taken For Granted said...

Most colorful and happy photo. May you have a very happy Thanksgiving with all the trimmings.

Sharon said...

The holiday certainly has evolved.
Happy Thanksgiving Jack!

Sylvia K said...

Thank you for the smiles and giggles to start the day -- Thanksgiving and all others as well!! Beautiful capture for the day! Wishing you a wonderful Thanksgiving, Jack, eat well and enjoy!!

William Kendall said...

Happy Thanksgiving, Jack!

jennyfreckles said...

I'm sure they were thankful.

We don't even have Thanksgiving but we are getting 'Black Friday' here nevertheless. It creeps in more year on year. And that's another prod to feel DISsatisfied, not thankful. That nagging feeling that you might bag a bargain if only you had the time, energy, foresight to get involved... Who needs that?

RedPat said...

I hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving, Jack!
Like Jenny said, we are having Black Friday sales here too but they started today so I hit some stores this morning.

Genie -- Paris and Beyond said...

Thank you for the beautiful Thanksgiving bouquet. We skipped the turkey and had fresh oysters!

Bises,
Genie

Randy said...

Nice flowers. I hope you have a Happy Thanksgiving.

Halcyon said...

Hope it was a wonderful day for you!