Things you may not know about Thanksgiving (though the U.S. Census Bureau does)

I receive oodles of press releases daily from a wide array of organizations and government bodies. Among them is the U.S. Census Bureau, which is warming up its PR engine in anticipation of the up-coming 2020 census, an official U.S. Constitutional requirement conducted every ten years.

This past week the Census Bureau issued an interesting/informative release on the subject of Thanksgiving, which (of course) will be celebrated Thursday.

Among the tidbits are:

* This will be the 399^th such event. That is, if you wish to say the first Thanksgiving was celebrated in Plymouth, Massachusetts. Don’t tell that to Virginians however, who claim the actual first Thanksgiving meal was served at Berkeley Plantation outside of what is today Richmond in 1619. Oysters and ham were the featured items there, not turkey and cranberries.

* In 1620, there were 2,499 Europeans in what would eventually become the 13 colonies. That number would grow to 374,388 one century later. Today the total population of the United States is 329,064,917.

* Just 53 pilgrims celebrated the fall harvest, an English tradition, in the New World in 1621. In 2018, some 22.8 million people in the U.S. reported English ancestry. The number in Massachusetts was 607,612.

* The first Thanksgiving included 90 Wampanoag Indians. The 2010 Census counted 6,500 members of the Wampanoag American Indian tribal grouping.

* Thanksgiving originated as a harvest festival. Thanksgiving has been celebrated nationally on and off since 1789, with a proclamation by George Washington after a request by Congress. Thomas Jefferson chose not to observe the holiday.

* The event became a national holiday on Oct. 3, 1863, when President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed the last Thursday of November as a national day of thanksgiving.

* Eventually, President Franklin Roosevelt would officially declare that Thanksgiving should always be celebrated on the fourth Thursday of the month. This, to encourage earlier holiday shopping.

- Jeffrey L. Frischkorn

JFrischk@Ameritech.net

JFrischk4@gmail.com