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Thanksgiving

November 24-25, 2011

November 24, 2011, which is the fourth Thursday of November, is designated as Thanksgiving Day in the United States. Tikalon holidays with the rest of the country, and we take Friday as a holiday as well.

Thanksgiving turkeyTurkey Time!

Turkey is the traditional holiday meal for Thanksgiving Day in the United States.

(Source image from Wikimedia Commons).

The symbol most associated with this holiday is the turkey, which has become the centerpiece of the holiday dinner. Foremost electrician, Benjamin Franklin, preferred the turkey to the bald eagle as the symbol of the United States. As he wrote in a letter to his daughter, Sarah Bache, on January 26, 1784,
"For my own part I wish the Bald Eagle had not been chosen the Representative of our Country... The Turkey is in Comparison a much more respectable Bird, and withal a true original Native of America."[1]

There's a lot of automotive travel on this holiday. It's been said that along with having the bald eagle as our national bird, we have the cement cloverleaf as our national flower.

Cloverleaf highway interchange.Cloverleaf interchange in Ohio connecting Interstate I-270 and Ohio OH-161.

(Via Wikimedia Commons).

Reference:

  1. Benjamin Franklin, letter to Sarah Bache, January 26, 1784, The Library of Congress.