Thanksgiving Research Article Writing

Thanksgiving and how it has Evolved

The First Thanksgiving

Through doing research on the history of Thanksgiving, I learned interesting information that I hadn’t known before about the very first Thanksgiving and how it has evolved. The first Thanksgiving wa3-day day celebration of a successful harvest in 1621. Although there were Native Americans from the Wampanoag tribe in attendance it is not for certain that they were necessarily invited as we imagine it now. One of the most interesting things I learned was that a large majority of the foods we associate with Thanksgiving now, were not present at the first Thanksgiving. For example, pumpkin pie is a Thanksgiving tradition for most families and is largely associated with the holiday, but pumpkin pie was not a part of the first Thanksgiving because they didn’t have the dough or ovens to make it! Historians aren’t even sure if turkey was apart of the first Thanksgiving. Through this research, I learned a lot more about the first Thanksgiving and how it actually happened. However, what i found most interesting was how it evolved into a national holiday.

Thanksgiving wasn’t always a national holiday, despite what we may think because of the fact we associate the first celebration of it in 1621. Although there may have been days that people dedicated to giving thanks,Thanksgiving wasn’t actually established into a national holiday until about 1854. Sarah Josepha Hale was a large contributor to the evolution of Thanksgiving from a celebration to a national holiday. In 1830 after publishing a novel about her family and how they celebrated what later became known as “Thanksgiving” she was hired to a leading position in the American Ladies Magazine. She used this platform not only to promote women’s issues but also to mail a letter to the president at the time, Abraham Lincoln. She wrote about the significance of the holiday and how it should be celebrated. While the president himself as well as others had tried to establish a national holiday revolving around giving thanks, these days were also largely associated with war because they typically marked victories of battles between the north and the south. Sometime after receiving Sarah’s letter, William Seward wrote a proclamation to declare the fourth Thursday of every November, Thanksgiving. President Lincoln signed and the proclamation passed. The government hoped this new holiday would help to “heal the wounds of the nation”. This was most interesting to me because I had always assumed that since the pilgrims Thanksgiving had been celebrated at the same time every year, but it wasn’t actually established until much later.

The part that I found most interesting about all of this is how we now have this almost stereotypical view of how the first Thanksgiving happened. We often think of pilgrims and Indians hand in hand around a large table giving thanks for the wonderful feast of turkey, corn, pie, and whatever other foods we think of when we hear Thanksgiving. However, I learned that this is not necessarily how it happened. Thanksgiving has evolved to fit this stereotypical celebration that we imagine happened at the first feast, and I find it interesting that what we often imagine isn’t what actually happened. I feel like when we as a modern society imagine past events to the best of our abilities, our conception of them often become a little misconstrued because we tend to only think of the most stereotypical version. While doing this can give a simpler, easier to understand version of history, it also causes us to lose some of the value of the events and what actually happened. I found the information that I learned about the first Thanksgiving very interesting because it cancelled out many of the false notions I had about the way it happened. For example, I found it interesting that it is believed that the number of Indians in attendance almost doubled that of the pilgrims. I was also very surprised when I learned that many of the foods that I associate with Thanksgiving, like turkey, weren’t actually apart of the first Thanksgiving meal. I think it is important for us to dive deeper and to learn more about past events to help create a better understanding so we can push past the stereotypical versions, and truly understand past events.

Sources:

New York Times

History

Smithsonian

MSN

12 Years a Slave Review

12 Years a Slave Review

12 Years a Slave

       In the New York Time's review of 12 Years a Slave the critic acknowledges the intense emotions that the movie stirs up within viewers. However, they also acknowledge the director's ability to cause these emotions without causing viewers to want to turn the movie off. The critic states that: "McQueen keeps everything moving so fluidly and efficiently that you're too busy worrying about Solomon. following him as he travels from auction house to plantation, to linger long in the emotions and ideas that the movie churns up." The critic states that the movie really helps to paint a picture of what slavery and segregation was truly like for the masses, despite the fact that the movie focuses primarily on just Solomon.

Slave Narrative

Slave Narrative

Frederick Douglass Slave Narrative

Frederick Douglass

          In this narrative, Douglass tells his feelings towards the relationships between slaves and slaveholders. He starts by explaining how troubled he felt as a child by the fact that a God who is supposedly "good" created black people to be slaves, and white people to be slaveholders. He mentions some of the discoveries he made during his time as a slave such as that many people tend to think of their masters as better than others or that killing slaves that act in self-defense is not a crime. 

Questions:

How did religious adult figures in Douglass's life explain this unfair reasoning to him?

What caused him to be so interested in the relationship between slaves and their masters? 

Paraphrase Practice

Paraphrase Practice

"But this is, after all, a movie, a drama, an entertainment (if you will), not a documentary. For all of our wailing about the lack of historical knowledge, awareness, teaching, and reading, historical and biographical movies increasingly feel compelled to pay a much heavier duty in period-correct appearances than the costume-dramas of our parents’ generation, and it’s satisfying to see that Spielberg pays his duty so lavishly. But a preoccupation with authenticity at the expense of story has capsized more than a few historical movies at their dock, and Lincoln has not entirely escaped that problem." - A Civil War Professor Reviews 'Lincoln': Daily Beast

My paraphrase of this selected passage is: Although the war professor critiquing Lincoln recognizes that Lincoln is meant more so for entertainment than that of a historical documentary, they commend the director for his dedication to making sure costumes and details are especially perfected to their time. Although they do acknowledge his ability to pay such fine attention to detail, they do not disregard the fact that he also has perfectly kept true to the story of Lincoln. The professor says that many historical films lack an interesting story due to the fact that they are trying to stay authentic to the time. Although they do commend Lincoln for their ability to stay true to the story, they agree that it at some points lacks an interesting story.

Music 1866-1880

Music 1866-1880

    

     

A Musical Theory Class Being Taught

  

The newspaper article that I read was focusing on the winners of a music competition. The performers are divided into different classes, numbered 1-6.  This is interesting because music was thought of so differently in those times than we think of it now. Now we can listen to music instantly through our phones but back then they had to go see a live performance to hear music. This is also interesting because in 1873 when this was published, they had to put the winners of a musical competition in newspapers, whereas now, winners of musical competitions, like The Voice are being broadcasted nationwide. I think sometimes it is easy for us to forget the convenience of everything we have now because of technology, so it is interesting to be reminded of the way things used to be done.

The Wheeling Daily Intelligence

Reconstruction Reflection

Reconstruction Reflection

The end of the reconstruction was due to many different events. The main event that led to the end of Reconstruction was the Republican advocates meeting secretly with Democrats to talk about Hayes's election. This led to power being restored to southern Democrats.
The End of Reconstruction

         
    The thing I found the most interesting about the newspapers I read was just how biased all the stories seemed to be in regards to white vs. "negroes". In the story, I read it described a fight that occurred between 1 white man and a group of negroes. The description of the fight almost sounded altered to make all the blame be put on the group of black males, making the white man seem like the obvious victim. This was interesting to me because, despite the fact that it was written in the newspaper which is supposed to be a reliable source, I found the story hard to believe. This is similar to what I expected to find because during this time black people were often being portrayed as violent people, incapable of expressing their emotions. Using an archive of newspapers is different than reading from a textbook because instead of reading about the event from an outside source, you are reading a primary source that is more accurate to the times.

The Weekly Clarion

Lincoln Questions

Lincoln Questions

Lincoln

1) Lincoln was uncompromising in the fact that he would not let others opinions change how he felt about slavery. Thaddeus Stevens thought that slaves should be free, and equal under the law, despite the fact that many disagreed with him. In the movie, Thaddeus does say that he believes slaves are only equal under the law, not every part of daily life. 

2) I think the movie does a good job of portraying the way Lincoln's feelings towards slavery changes. While he has always had a disdain for slavery because of the way it violates our moral principals, he moves to a hatred for it because of not only the way it violates our moral principals but also because it is increasingly disrupting the state of our nation. 

3) Lincoln desperately wanted the 13th Amendment to be passed because it seemed like it would be the best way to end fighting between the north and the south, but also to end slavery which he had always been against. 

4) The film used many different scenes to express the different views of the northerners and southerners feelings towards racial equality. One of the biggest reasons they highlighted why the south did not want slaves to be freed was because of the fear that they would have the same voting rights as them. Because if the slaves are now given the ability to vote, they could completely change the way things were being run. For the northerners, however, wanted to end slavery but didn't necessarily want racial equality because they too had many of the same fears as the southerners. 

5) In the film, many people were scared to end slavery primarily because of the radical change it would bring to the nation. This had been apart of our way of life for so long it was scary for them to imagine slaves who they had dehumanized for so long, to now have rights just like themselves.