Giving and Thanksgiving

No empty plates
this Thanksgiving

Help set the table for 14 million Americans

Every dollar you give helps provide 16 meals for families in need


No empty plates
this Thanksgiving


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
At Feeding America, we understand how important advocacy is to our ability to end hunger in America. The support of individuals like you helps make it possible for us to show our nation just how and why Feeding America is critical to the fight to end hunger.

As we introduce our new name and look to the public, we’re encouraging our advocates to become actively involved as brand ambassadors by sharing their personal commitments to Feeding America. The stories of advocates like you will be critical as we introduce our new name to legislators, the media, and the communities we serve. Your story can help us better convey that Feeding America is about even more than donating food, money, and time—it’s also about supporting policies and actions that take us closer as a nation to finding solutions to the problem of hunger.

Tell us why you’re committed to the fight against hunger. Tell us why you are Feeding America. Please take a moment to share your story with us today.


1 in 8 Americans are at risk of hunger in America




THANKSGIVING DAY - meaning of
Thanksgiving will be celebrated in the US on Thursday, November 27, 2008.

Like a slow-roasted turkey, the American holiday of Thanksgiving was a long time in the making.

In autumn 1621, about a year after the Mayflower Pilgrims made landfall at Plymouth, they put together a feast and broke bread with their Native American neighbors, the Wampanoag, who were celebrating Keepunumuk, the time of the harvest. The menu featured fowl, venison and fish, along with wheat and corn products. A contemporary account written by colonist Edward Winslow showed the assembled to be content with their lot:


And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us [when we were back in England], yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want that we often wish you [our English brethren] partakers of our plenty.

Sporadic national, regional and individual Thanksgivings followed, but the day did not become an annual, national holiday until 1863. Americans were waging the Civil War, and in the midst of it President Abraham Lincoln, spurred on by the lobbying efforts of writer Sarah Josepha Hale, proclaimed a national day in which to express thanks for the many blessings enjoyed by Americans, e.g., natural resources and population growth, despite the military conflict:


They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.

It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and voice by the whole American people. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.

It wasn't till later in the 19th century, though, that the popular image of the "First Thanksgiving" took root. Earlier, while the Indian wars were still raging, scenes of settlers and natives engaging in joint revelry seemed inconceivable.

In 1939, during the Great Depression, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt famously modified Lincoln's chosen date of the last Thursday of November to the second-to-last Thursday of November in order to extend the post-Thanksgiving, pre-Christmas shopping season. The move was met with confusion and criticism, and in 1942 FDR signed a law making Thanksgiving the fourth Thursday of November, a law which is still in effect today.

Nowadays, Thanksgiving is one of the few truly secular, nondenominational holidays on the US calendar (the Fourth of July is another). Americans celebrate with a long weekend, a big meal with family and friends (on the menu: foods that reflect the tastes and colors of the autumn harvest, such as roast turkey, pumpkin pie, cranberry sauce and candied yams), and football.

Facts and Figures
(courtesy of the US Census Department press release for Thanksgiving)

There were 256 million turkeys raised in the US in 2005 (Minnesota had the most); 624million pounds of cranberries (Wisconsin led); 1.6 billion pounds of sweet potatoes in 2004 (North Carolina led); and 998 million pounds of pumpkins (Illinois led).
The average American consumed 13.7 pounds of turkey and 4.7 pounds of sweet potatoes in 2003.
Thanksgiving football goes back to 1876, when the Intercollegiate Football Association held its championship on Thanksgiving Day.
The first NFL Thanksgiving Day game was held in 1920, when the Akron Pros routed the Canton Bulldogs 7-0.
The Detroit Lions have played Thanksgiving Day football since 1934, when they lost to the Chicago Bears 19-16.
The Thanksgiving Day football series went on hiatus 1939-44 due to WWII.
Nowadays, there are two Thanksgiving Day games. The Dallas Cowboys began their tradition in 1966 with a 26-14 win over the Cleveland Browns.