THE SHOALS-Well it is that time of year again….you eat too much…drink too much and watch enough football to cause concussions. Yes folks it’s Thanksgiving, the time we enjoy our family, food, fun, and football but here at The Quad-Cities Daily we love weird and little know facts so here ya go…Some things you might not have known about our beloved holiday Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving from The Quad-Cities Daily!
The author of the nursery rhyme “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” Sarah Josepha Hale, was an influential advocate for making Thanksgiving a national holiday.
Benjamin Franklin proposed the turkey as the official United States bird, and was not happy when the bald eagle was chosen instead. In a letter to his daughter, Franklin referred to the eagle’s “bad moral character” and proclaimed “For my own part I wish the Eagle had not been chosen the representative of our country… For in Truth, the Turk’y is in comparison a much more respectable bird.”
Not to be outdone, Thomas Jefferson thought a Federal holiday for Thanksgiving was “the most ridiculous idea” ever conceived. It’s been said that Benjamin Franklin named the male turkey “Tom” to spite Thomas.
The biggest turkey ever raised weighed 86 pounds, about the size of a large dog.
James Pierpont originally composed the song Jingle Bells in 1857 for children celebrating Thanksgiving at his Boston Sunday School. It gained popularity so quickly that it was repeated again at Christmas, and after that….well Dashing all the way!
Black Friday – the day after Thanksgiving and the most profitable shopping day of the year – got its name from the old accounting practice of using red ink for debt and black ink for profit.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Minnesota is the top turkey-producing state in America, with a planned production total of 49 million in 2008. Just six states — Minnesota, North Carolina, Arkansas, Virginia, Missouri and Indiana — will probably produce two-thirds of the estimated 271 million birds that will be raised in the U.S. this year.
Long before the Pilgrims, native Hawaiians celebrated the longest thanksgiving in the world—Makahiki, which lasted four months, from November through February.
A Thanksgiving dinner staple, cranberries were actually used by Native Americans to treat arrow wounds and dye clothes.
The night before Thanksgiving is the single biggest day for bar sales in the US. Bigger than New Year’s Eve, the Super Bowl and and even St. Patrick’s Day!
