Wall Street Institute Pistoia's Blog: 11/01/2009

The First Thanksgiving
In 1621, the Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians shared an autumn harvest feastfesta del raccolto (believed to have occurred around the 29th of September) which is acknowledgedè riconosciuta today as one of the first Thanksgiving celebrations in the colonies. This harvest meal has become a symbol of cooperation and interaction between English colonists and Native Americans. Although this feast is considered by many to be the very first Thanksgiving celebration, it was actually in keeping with a long tradition of celebrating the harvest and giving thanks for a successful bountyabbondanza of cropsraccolti, colture.
Native American groups throughout the Americas, including the Pueblo, Cherokee, Creek and many others organized harvest festivals, ceremonial dances, and other celebrations of thanks for centuries before the arrival of Europeans in North America. The original feast in 1621 occurred sometime between September 21 and November 11. Unlike our modern holiday, it was three days long. During the American Revolution a yearly day of national thanksgiving was suggested by the Continental Congress. In 1817 New York State adopted Thanksgiving Day as an annual custom, and by the middle of the 19th century many other states had done the same. In 1863 President Abraham Lincoln appointedstabilì, designò a day of thanksgiving as the last Thursday in November, which he may have correlated with the November 21, 1621, anchoringl’ancoraggio of the Mayflower at Cape Cod. Since then, each president has issued a Thanksgiving Day proclamation. President Franklin D. Roosevelt set the date for Thanksgiving to the fourth Thursday of November in 1939 (approved by Congress in 1941).

Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade
Originally known as Macy'scatena americana di grandi magazzini Christmas Parade - to signify the launch of the Christmas shopping season - the first Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade took place in New York City in 1924. It was launched by Macy's employees and featured animals from the Central Park Zoo. Today, some 3 million people attend the annual parade and another 44 million watch it on television.
Tony Sarg, a children's book illustrator and puppeteerburattinaio, designed the first giant hot air balloons for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 1927. He later created the elaborate mechanically animated window displays that graceadorna the façade of the New York storegrandi magazzini from Thanksgiving to Christmas.
Snoopy has appeared as a giant balloon in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade more times than any other character in history. As the Flying Ace, Snoopy made his sixth appearance in the 2006 parade.
Macy's wasn’t the first American department store to sponsor a parade in celebration of Thanksgiving. The Philadelphia department store Gimbel's had sponsored a parade in 1920, but the Macy's parade, launched four years later, soon became a Thanksgiving tradition and the standard kickoffavvio to the holiday shopping season. The parade became ever more well-known after it featured prominently in the hit film Miracle on 34th Street (1947), which shows actual footagefilmati, spezzoni of the 1946 parade. In addition to its famous giant balloons and floats, the Macy's parade features live music and other performances, including by the Radio City Music Hall Rockettes and cast members of well-known Broadway shows.

Turkeystacchini and Cooking
In a letter to his daughter sent in 1784, Benjamin Franklin suggested that the wild turkey would be a more appropriate national symbol for the newly independent United States than the bald eagleaquila di mare testabianca (which had earlier been chosen by the Continental Congress). He argued that the turkey was "a much more respectable Bird," "a true original Native of America," and "thoughsebbene a little vainvanitoso & sillysciocco, a Bird of Courage."
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Minnesota is the top turkey-producing state in America, with a production total of 49 million in 2008.
The National Turkey Federation estimated that 46 million turkeys - one fifth of the annual total of 235 million consumed in the United States in 2007 - were eaten at Thanksgiving.
The cranberrymirtillo rosso is one of only three fruits - the others are the blueberrymirtillo and the Concord grapespecie americana di uva da vino - that are entirely native to North American soilsuolo, according to the Cape Cod Cranberry Growerscoltivatori Association.
The turkey trotballo detto "trotto del tacchino", modeled on that bird's characteristic short, jerkytraballanti, irregolari steps, was one of a number of popular dance styles that emerged during the late 19th and early 20th century in the United States. The two-step, a simple dance that required little to no instruction, was quickly followed by such dances as the one-step, the turkey trot, the fox trot and the bunny hugballo detto “abbraccio del coniglio”, which could all be performed to the ragtime and jazz music popular at the time.
Turkey contains the essential amino acid tryptophan, which is a natural sedative, but so do a lot of other foods, including chicken, beef, pork, beans and cheese. Though many people believe turkey's tryptophan content is what makes many people feel sleepy after a big Thanksgiving meal, it is more likely the combination of fats and carbohydrates most people eat with the turkey, as well as the large amount of food (not to mention alcohol, in some cases) consumed, that makes most people feel like following their meal up with a nap.
According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the largest pumpkin pietorta di zucca ever baked weighed 2,020 pounds and measured just over 12 feet long. It was baked on October 8, 2005 by the New Bremen Giant Pumpkin Growers in Ohio, and included 900 pounds of pumpkin, 62 gallons of evaporated milk, 155 dozen eggs, 300 pounds of sugar, 3.5 pounds of salt, 7 pounds of cinnamoncannella, 2 pounds of pumpkin spice and 250 pounds of crustimpasto base.
Three towns in the U.S. take their name from the traditional Thanksgiving bird, including Turkey, Texas (pop. 465); Turkey Creek, Louisiana (pop. 363); and Turkey, North Carolina (pop. 270).The first time the Detroit Lions played football on Thanksgiving Day was in 1934, when they hosted the Chicago Bears at the University of Detroit stadium, in front of 26,000 fans. The NBC radio network broadcast the game on 94 stations across the country - the first national Thanksgiving football broadcast. Since that time, the Lions have played a game every Thanksgiving (except between 1939 and 1944); in 1956, fans watched the game on television for the first time.

Miscellaneous
In 2001, the U.S. Postal Service issuedha emesso a commemorative Thanksgiving stampfrancobollo. Designed by the artist Margaret Cusack in a style resembling traditional folk-art needleworkricamo, it depicted a cornucopia overflowing with fruits and vegetables, under the phrase "We Give Thanks."
Despite record-high gas prices (more than $3.00 per gallon) in 2007, the American Automobile Association (AAA) estimated that 38.7 million Americans would travel 50 miles or more from home for the Thanksgiving holiday, a slightleggero increase (1.5 percent) over the previous year.

Thanksgiving receips