Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope that none of you are reading this. I hope that you are fortunate enough that you are surrounded with family and friends, not sitting at your computer scouring the web for history blog post.

But maybe you are like me…waiting for your wife to get ready. Ready and waiting, with nothing but time to kill. Or maybe you are traveling today, and as the passenger, you have nothing better to do. I had a few minutes, so I wanted to help you cut out the boring post, and give you a few great sites to visit.

So if just have three minutes to kill, check out this list of Thanksgiving Fast Facts, from About.com.

• While most Americans think of the Pilgrims as celebrating the first Thanksgiving in America, there are some claims that others in the New World should be recognized as first. For example, in Texas there is a marker that says, “Feast of the First Thanksgiving – 1541.”
• The date of what is typically recognized as the first Thanksgiving is not precisely known though it occurred between September 21 and November 9, 1621. The Plymouth Pilgrims dined with the Wampanoag Indians for the first Thanksgiving.
• The First Thanksgiving lasted for three days.
• According to Edward Winslow, a participant in the first Thanksgiving, the feast consisted of corn, barley, fowl including wild turkeys and waterfowl, and venison.
• 52 Pilgrims attended the first Thanksgiving in 1621 including John Alden, William Bradford, Priscilla Mullins, and Miles Standish.
• Approximately 50 Native Americans attended the first Thanksgiving including Massasoit and Squanto – the Pilgrim’s translator.
• The First Thanksgiving was actually a secular event that was not repeated. A Calvinist Thanksgiving actually did occur in 1623 and did not involve sharing food with the Native Americans.
• The first national celebration of Thanksgiving was declared in 1775 by the Continental Congress. This was to celebrate the win at Saratoga during the American Revolution. However, this was not an annual event.
• In 1863, two national days of Thanksgiving were declared: One celebrated the Union victory at the Battle of Gettysburg. The other began the Thanksgiving holiday we still celebrate today.
• The author of “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” Sarah Josepha Hale, was key in getting Thanksgiving officially recognized as a national holiday.
• Each year the President officially declares a day of National Thanksgiving.
• Since Harry Truman, every president has pardoned a turkey for Thanksgiving.

If you are seeking more than a simple list because your wife spends 45 minutes drying her hair, you will see two different types of stories today: 1) The story of Thanksgiving, and 2) The Assassination of JFK. Here are some of those stories worth checking out!

SLICETHELIFE’s PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY ASSASSINATED 49 YEARS AGO TODAY

Belle Grove’s Thanksgiving in Virginia

Martin Kelly, About.com’s Myths and Realities of Thanksgiving

If you aren’t familiar with the picture above, it is the work of Normal Rockwell. Look how happy everyone is. Hopefully your day will look like this.

http://hankeringforhistory.com/2012/11/22/happy-thanksgiving/

Today in history, Nov 22nd!

Some of the great historical events that happened today in history, on November 22nd!

Today’s historical facts are from various sites including, but not limited too: the History Channel, The New York Times, WHG Historynet.com, HistoryOrb.com, and On This Day blogs from my blogroll.

http://hankeringforhistory.com/2012/11/22/today-in-history-nov-22nd/

1220	After promising to go to the aid of the Fifth Crusade within nine months, Frederick II is crowned emperor by Pope Honorius III.
1542	New laws are passed in Spain giving Indians in America protection against enslavement.
1718	English pirate Edward Teach – better known as “Blackbeard” – was killed during a battle off the Virginia coast.
1757	The Austrian army defeats the Prussians at Breslau in the Seven Years War.
1847	In New York, the Astor Place Opera House, the city’s first operatic theater, is opened.
1890	Charles de Gaulle was born in Lille, France.
1902	A fire causes considerable damage to the unfinished Williamsburg bridge in New York.
1906	The SOS distress signal was adopted at the International Radio Telegraphic Convention in Berlin.
1915	The Anglo-Indian army, led by British General Sir Charles Townshend, attacks a larger Turkish force under General Nur-ud-Din at Ctesiphon, Iraq, but is repulsed.
1919	A Labor conference committee in the United States urges an eight-hour workday and a 48-hour week.
1928	“Bolero” by Maurice Ravel debuted in Paris.
1928	British King George is confined to bed with a congested lung; the queen is to take over duties.
1935	Pan Am inaugurates the first transpacific airmail service from San Francisco to Manila.
1936	1,200 soldiers are killed in a battle between the Japanese and Mongolians in China.
1942	Soviet troops complete the encirclement of the German Sixth Army at Stalingrad.
1948	Ho Chi Minh’s Democratic Republic of Vietnam requests admittance to the UN.
1963	Lee Harvey Oswald assassinates President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas. Lyndon B. Johnson becomes president.
1964	Almost 40,000 people pay tribute to John F. Kennedy at Arlington Cemetery on the first anniversary of his death.
1967	The U.N. Security Council approved Resolution 242, which called for Israel to withdraw from territories it captured in 1967, and implicitly called on adversaries to recognize Israel’s right to exist.
1968	The Beatles’ “White Album” was released.
1973	Great Britain announces a plan for moderate Protestants and Catholics to share power in Northern Ireland.
1975	Juan Carlos was proclaimed king of Spain.
1980	Eighteen Communist Party secretaries in 49 provinces are ousted from Poland.
1982	President Ronald Reagan calls for defense-pact deployment of the MX missile.
1986	Justice Department finds memo in Lt. Col. Oliver North’s office on the transfer of $12 million to Contras of Nicaragua from Iranian arms sale.
1990	British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, having failed to win re-election to the Conservative Party leadership on the first ballot, announced her resignation.
1998	“60 Minutes” aired video of Dr. Jack Kevorkian administering lethal drugs to a terminally ill patient.
2004	Tens of thousands of demonstrators jammed downtown Kiev, denouncing Ukraine’s presidential runoff election as fraudulent and chanting the name of reform candidate Viktor Yushchenko.
2005	Jose Padilla, an American once accused of plotting with al-Qaida to detonate a radioactive “dirty bomb,” was charged with supporting terrorism.
2005	Ted Koppel hosted his final edition of ABC News’ “Nightline.”
2005	The Microsoft video game console Xbox 360 went on sale.