Thanksgiving means different things to many Americans. Traditionalists anticipate a gathering of loved ones for a meal and collective appreciation of the bounty we enjoy, like the familiar pilgrim holiday. Modern shoppers may also give thanks, but may be spending the evening planning their Black Friday shopping map. Sports enthusiasts associate the holiday with a meal followed by some gridiron action, either in the yard or on a screen. Regardless of how we celebrate, we know when to expect it and plan accordingly. This was not always so, as history has taught us.
President Washington, proclaimed in 1789, that our new country would celebrate a “day of publick (sic) Thanksgiving” on Thursday, November 26. Over the years, this came and went, and the date often changed. In one of his last official acts in office Robert Perkins Letcher, Kentucky’s fifteenth governor and this writer’s fourth great-granduncle, proclaimed September 26, 1844, our Commonwealth’s first official day of Thanksgiving. In 1863, President Lincoln proclaimed the last Thursday each November as accepted national tradition.
This custom continued across America, uninterrupted until 1939, the tail end of the Great Depression. Economic recovery was on the horizon, and retailers recognized that the period between Thanksgiving and Christmas could make or break the bottom line. Because November ended on Thursday the 30th, this shortened the holiday shopping season significantly. Therefore, President Franklin D. Roosevelt made a controversial decision; Thanksgiving would be moved back a week, to November 23rd. The moniker “Franksgiving,” attributed to Atlantic City mayor Thomas D. Taggert, Jr., began to grow in some circles.
This change was observed by about half of the retail-minded nation. The governors of our neighboring states of Indiana and Ohio signed on to Roosevelt’s plan, but here in Kentucky, Governor A. B. “Happy” Chandler dug in and stuck to the traditional fourth Thursday; understandably, this caused some mix-ups. Many Northern Kentucky schools followed the schedule that had always been in place, while others changed the district vacation days to follow the President’s plan. Happily, some fortunate students in Kentucky were given both celebration periods off school.
Most of Boone County’s churches agreed the best solution would be to hold two Thanksgiving services that year, but there still appeared to be some confusion as to when to have the traditional feast. During the first couple of weeks of November, both of Boone County’s newspapers had multiple clarifications of which tradition was to be followed. So many organizations were conflicted about this change that the word “Thanksgiving” was followed by the preferred date in parentheses in newspaper notices. Boone County’s schools were off on November 30th, while the postal workers followed the new federal holiday of November 23rd.
Thankfully, “Franksgiving” only held for two more years before a post-holiday 1941 joint resolution of Congress settled the date to our current tradition: the fourth Thursday of November. It seems that legislation moves more quickly when there’s pie involved.
