Thanks To Sarah Josepha Hale For Giving Us Thanksgiving
Last edited Fri Nov 24, 2017, 03:57 PM - Edit history (1)
(From Wikipedia)
Sarah Josepha Hale (October 24, 1788 - April 30, 1879) may be the individual most responsible for making Thanksgiving a national holiday in the United States.
It had previously been celebrated only in New England.
Each state scheduled it's own holiday, some as early as October and others as late as January.
It was largely unknown in the American South.
Her advocacy for the national holiday began in 1846 and lasted 17 years before it was successful.
In support of the proposed national holiday, Hale wrote letters to five Presidents of the United States: Zachary Taylor, Milliard Fillmore, Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, and Abraham Lincoln.
Her initial letters failed to persuade, but the letter she wrote to Lincoln convinced him to support legislation establishing a national holiday of Thanksgiving in 1863.
The new national holiday was considered a unifying day after the stress of the American Civil War.
Before Thanksgiving's addition, the only national holidays celebrated in the United States were Washington's Birthday and Independence Day.
"Nor need we power or splendor, wide hall or lordly dome; the good, the true, the tender - these form the wealth of home."
Sarah Josepha Hale
