Publication Date: November 27, 2025

Millions of Americans celebrate Thanksgiving, a federal holiday marked by family gatherings, feasts featuring turkey and pumpkin pie, and expressions of gratitude. Established as a national day of thanks, the holiday traces its roots to a 1621 harvest celebration between Pilgrims and the Wampanoag people in Plymouth, Massachusetts.

Facts

• The first Thanksgiving harvest feast occurred in autumn 1621 in Plymouth Colony (present-day Massachusetts) and lasted three days. Approximately 90 Wampanoag men and 53 English settlers attended.
• President George Washington issued the first national Thanksgiving proclamation in 1789, declaring November 26 a day of “public thanksgiving and prayer.”
• In 1863, in the middle of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed Thanksgiving a national holiday to be observed annually on the last Thursday of November, with the intent to foster unity and gratitude.
• In 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt moved the holiday to the fourth Thursday of November to extend the Christmas shopping season during the Great Depression. Congress made this permanent in 1941.
• Thanksgiving is one of eleven federal holidays in the United States. In 2025, it falls on November 27.
• The Thanksgiving meal traditionally includes roast turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie.
• Approximately 46 million turkeys are consumed each Thanksgiving, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
• The day after Thanksgiving, known as Black Friday, has become the unofficial start of the Christmas shopping season.

Analysis

Thanksgiving occupies a unique place in American culture. It is the only major federal holiday explicitly dedicated to gratitude rather than a historical or religious figure. Unlike Independence Day or Christmas, it carries no mandatory religious observance, allowing families to define its meaning themselves.

For many Americans, Thanksgiving remains a cherished ritual of reunion and abundance. Surveys consistently show it is the most widely celebrated family holiday, surpassing even Christmas in the percentage of adults who travel to gather with relatives.

Yet the holiday’s origin story has come under increasing scrutiny. Primary documents from Pilgrim leader William Bradford and settler Edward Winslow describe the 1621 feast as a secular harvest celebration, not a religious “thanksgiving.” Modern Indigenous voices, including the United American Indians of New England and the Wampanoag Tribe, emphasize that the peaceful gathering was followed within a generation by violent conflict, land loss, and disease that devastated Native populations. Many Native communities now observe Thanksgiving as a National Day of Mourning.

Retail and consumer perspectives have also reshaped the day. The creation of Black Friday and, more recently, weeks-long pre-Thanksgiving sales have turned a season of gratitude into the kickoff for holiday consumerism. At the same time, volunteer organizations report record demand for Thanksgiving meal assistance, highlighting persistent food insecurity affecting more than 41 million Americans.

Considerations

• Despite its history, Thanksgiving remains an enduring tradition to take a break from the normal routines of life, see folks we may not have seen for a while, eat more than we should, and wonder at the abundance of resources at our disposal.

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