20 responses so far ↓

• 1 Darryl W. Perry // Nov 25, 2010 at 12:25 pm

  Why does everyone forget about the Thanksgiving celebration held in Jamestown 2 yrs before the Plymouth colony was even established?

• 2 Kimberly Wilder // Nov 25, 2010 at 12:58 pm

  Darryl…Why don’t you post a few words about it?

• 3 Michael H. Wilson // Nov 25, 2010 at 1:49 pm

  re #1 lack of decent P.R.

• 4 Darryl W. Perry // Nov 25, 2010 at 2:19 pm

  In 1607 the Jamestowne settlement was established in present day Virginia. For the first 12 years of the colony there was no established or recognized government.
  The first representative assembly in the New World convened in the Jamestown church on July 30, 1619.[1] The General Assembly met in response to orders from the Virginia Company “to establish one equal and uniform government over all Virginia” which would provide “just laws for the happy guiding and governing of the people there inhabiting.”
  Later that year on December 4, A group of settlers arrived where they held a service thanking God for their safe arrival. Some suggest this was the true first Thanksgiving in America, ahead of the Pilgrims’ arrival in Massachusetts. Before leaving England, the new settlers vowed: “Wee ordaine that the day of our ships arrivall at the place assigned for plantacon in the land of Virginia shall be yearly and perpetually keept holy as a day of Thanksgiving to Almighty God.”[2] Those words are carved in a brick gazebo marking the approximate location of their landing along the James River in Berkeley Plantation.

  The first Thanksgiving celebration was NOT because of a “bountiful harvest” or because the settlers were “saved from starvation” by a group of natives. The first day of Thanksgiving in the new world, was a day to give thanks for a safe arrival from England.

  Notes
  1 – http://www.jamestowne.org/Jamestowne_Society_Chronology.htm
  2 – http://www.virginia.org/site/features.asp?featureid=50

• 5 Michael H. Wilson // Nov 25, 2010 at 2:38 pm

  Nice piece. Thank you.
  MW

• 6 Bill Wood // Nov 25, 2010 at 2:56 pm

  Thanks Darryl! I remember reading about this many years ago in the Richmond Times-Dispatch. A side note: A Virginia Native American Tribe still pay their taxes in deer and turkey.

• 7 Robert Capozzi // Nov 25, 2010 at 3:26 pm

  One event doesn’t make a tradition. Did the tradition continue in Jamestown, or was it a one-shot deal?

  If Plymouthers had their’s year after year, and Jamestown didn’t, that might go a long way in explaining why the tradition is traced back to Plymouth.

  Good marketing requires consistent messaging.

  History is riddled with myths based on half truths. The myth and reality of Columbus, for ex., might cause us to not honor his memory, either.

• 8 Darryl W. Perry // Nov 25, 2010 at 4:32 pm

  @RC – I’ve seen nothing to suggest that the Plymouth settlers had a Thanksgiving annually.

  And most people are not taught in school about the Jamestowne settlement other than a brief mention of John Smith & Pocahontas.

• 9 Robert Capozzi // Nov 25, 2010 at 4:59 pm

  DP, it appears there was a “thanksgiving” in FL nearly 100 years prior to Plymouth, too. History depends on who writes it or lobbies most effectively for their POV, it seems.

• 10 Darryl W. Perry // Nov 25, 2010 at 5:21 pm

  After a quick google search, I found several sites claiming a “thanksgiving” in St. Augustine on September 8, 1565 – but nothing citing historical records, though it is reported early records from the area were destroyed in approx 1589.

  I stand corrected.

• 11 Gene Trosper // Nov 25, 2010 at 6:00 pm

  Debates regarding who held the first Thanksgiving aside, I wish everyone here a wonderful Thanksgiving Day wherever they may be.

• 12 Michael H. Wilson // Nov 26, 2010 at 12:14 am

  Here’s a little bit we probably never heard about in regards to Thanksgiving.

  “And this food item, likely on the table of that first Thanksgiving, would have carried special significance to those remaining colonists. Eels — a forgotten staple of our forefathers.”

  http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/25/opinion/25prosek.html

• 13 Michael H. Wilson // Nov 26, 2010 at 1:51 am

  All quiet here. Everyone must be off to target at 3 a.m.

• 14 Kimberly Wilder // Nov 26, 2010 at 6:45 am

  Darryl,

  Thanks for taking the time to write up a little history. I don’t think I ever heard the story of the Jamestown or the St. Augustine Thanksgiving.

  Hope everyone had a good one.

  After all the joy of a lot of relatives and a lot of food crammed into one day, I am ready for a lot of rest.

  

• 15 Robert Capozzi // Nov 26, 2010 at 7:37 am

  dp, my intent wasn’t to “correct” you, per se. Some mythmaking seems benign enough to play along with — so I’m OK with the Plymouth Thanksgiving myth, even if technically it was not the first such autumnal harvest feast between Europeans and Native Americans.

  Sometimes, myth busting gives rise to alternative myths. Not Plymouth, it was Jamestown! turns out to not be quite right if you ask the St. Augustinians.

  History is often this way. It was a Civil War over slavery gives way to it was a secession over trade gives way to it was over both, competing interpretations of the Constitution, and then some. It seems we need narratives to explain the world, but narratives depend on sorting out myriad datapoints for salience. Narrative myths may be useful as we stumble along the path to truth; investing in narrative myths as THE TRUTH seems unwise to me.

• 16 North and South // Nov 26, 2010 at 9:11 am

  The reason why Plymouth thanksgiving is better known is that Northerners made the effort to promote Thanksgiving as a national holiday in an effort to create nationwide traditions and overcome sectionalism.

• 17 Tom Blanton // Nov 27, 2010 at 1:30 am

  And most people are not taught in school about the Jamestowne settlement other than a brief mention of John Smith & Pocahontas.

  If you live in Virginia, they teach you about it – over and over again.

  Growing up in Richmond, they taught all about Jamestown every year in elementary school. I remember visiting Jamestown and seeing the replicas of the boats that came over.

  The Civil War was a big topic, too. They taught us about how Grant burned Richmond. Of course, that never happened. The Confederate Army burned Richmond as they retreated while the Union Army was coming into Richmond.

  There’s just no telling what happened in Jamestown. Everything they taught about it is probably bullshit.

• 18 Robert Capozzi // Nov 27, 2010 at 6:00 am

  tb: Everything they taught about it is probably bullshit.

  me: Agreed. I go further: Everything they taught about *everything* is probably bullshit.

• 19 Michael H. Wilson // Nov 27, 2010 at 10:35 am

  I’ll bet the Vikings celebrated Thanksgiving from their settlements in the New World.

• 20 Jose C // Nov 28, 2010 at 1:05 pm

  El Paso has entered the sweepstakes. According to the Texas historical society:

  El Paso residents now claim the first Thanksgiving in North America. The modern event, first observed in April 1989, commemorates a day of thanksgiving celebrated by Spanish explorer Juan de Onate and his expedition on April 30, 1598.

  After a long expedition from Santa Barbara in southern Chihuahua to El Paso . . .

  Oñate ordered a day of thanksgiving for the survival of the expedition. Included in the event was a feast, supplied with game by the Spaniards and with fish by the natives of the region. A mass was said by the Franciscan missionaries traveling with the expedition . . .

  A member of the expedition wrote of the original celebration, “We built a great bonfire and roasted the meat and fish, and then all sat down to a repast the like of which we had never enjoyed before. We were happy that our trials were over; as happy as were the passengers in the Ark when they saw the dove returning with the olive branch in his beak, bringing tidings that the deluge had subsided.”

  I hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving.

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