Editor’s Cuff Notes – by Dan Willis. THE 1621 THANKSGIVING The tradition of the Pilgrims’ first Thanksgiving comes from both myth and legend. Few people realize that the Pilgrims never celebrated Thanksgiving in 1621 or any year thereafter. President George Washington made it a one-time Thanksgiving holiday. In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln finally made it a national holiday to be celebrated on the last Thursday in November (which could occasionally end up being the fifth Thursday and hence too close to Christmas for businesses). President Franklin D. Roosevelt changed Thanksgiving Day to the fourth Thursday of November in 1939 and Congress approved that day in 1941. The Pilgrims’ first mythological Thanksgiving Day occurred in early October. The date of Thanksgiving, set by President Lincoln, seems to correlate with the anchoring of the Mayflower at Cape Cod, which supposedly occurred on November 21, 1620 according to the Gregorian calendar (It was…
