Comments on: The Grinch Who Moved Thanksgiving

By: Siarlys Jenkins

Siarlys Jenkins — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 21:53:14 +0000

Christmas is an even more sordid tale.

New England had criminal penalties for celebrating Christmas — not because they were atheists, but because it was considered Popish idolatry. High church Anglicans further south attended Christmas mass — sometimes it was the only time of the year they went to church — but that was about all. It wasn’t until the 1840s that observance of Christmas became a common event. It was inspired, naturally, but a committee of New York businessmen, looking for a way to expand midwinter sales.

So, when you hear people talking about putting Christ back into Christmas, well, that’s because Christ was never really part of it to begin with.

By: Happy Thanksgiving « De Regno Christi

Happy Thanksgiving « De Regno Christi — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 15:52:54 +0000

[...] thankful, enjoy your family, celebrate with feasting. And don’t miss Bill Kauffman’s excellent The Grinch Who Moved Thanksgiving over at the Front [...]

By: Moving Thanksgiving Makes As Much Sense as Sales Tax Holidays | Expert Reviews!

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 11:18:47 +0000

[...] to create an additional week of Christmas shopping. Roosevelt, over much public opposition, did so. Many states refused to move the holiday and some states even celebrated both. In 1940 and 1941, Roosevelt proclaimed [...]

By: E.A. Andonian

E.A. Andonian — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 02:16:40 +0000

I feel much more informed about Thanksgiving’s history after having read this article, Uncle Bill. We will indeed toast Sarah Josepha Hale at our Thanksgiving dinner. Thanks.

By: Bill Kauffman

Bill Kauffman — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 21:28:25 +0000

How to honor FDR, John? Hmmm…how about a morning reading (under slate gray November sky) of Robinson Jeffers’s The Double Axe (1948), a volume of anti-FDR, anti-empire poems? Bennett Cerf and Random House refused to publish ten of the poems, including one which had FDR meeting Woodrow Wilson in Hell.
But hey, it’s Thanksgiving, and I give thanks that Jeffers, whom Robert Hass called “an old-fashioned Jeffersonian republican…defender of the spartan and honest American commonweal against the thickening of empire,” is still read, while such FDR lickspittles as Archibald MacLeish (e.e. cummings called him “macarchibald maclapdog macleish”) molder unread.
So let’s instead raise a glass of pre-turkey beer to the only good Roosevelt—Teddy’s irrepressible daughter Alice, who called her cousin “Feather Duster Roosevelt” and who once sighed, “When I think of Franklin and Eleanor in the White House, I could grind my teeth to powder and blow them out my nose.”

By: D.W. Sabin

D.W. Sabin — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 19:47:49 +0000

“Its a damned Yankee Institution”…..so it seems, is Winning the World Series.

Despite brushing up hard against the wretchedness of so called “Black Friday”…it is likely one of the best, if not the best holiday of the year…for its simplicity….cooking a turkey, trading lies and family stories…often one in the same, and deciding who will be the collective object of ridicule this year. All culminating in falling to sleep to football.

Happy Thanksgiving to all….and a moment of Thanks for the ever-reliable humorous strolls of Kauffman.
Best Wishes to even Lundy.

By: FDR Changes Thanksgiving

FDR Changes Thanksgiving — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 13:26:29 +0000

[...] Kauffman, a Batavia local and my favorite writer at Front Porch Republic, gives us some interesting Thanksgiving history. Read the entire article. It’s very funny. Here’s a teaser: It seems that in 1939 [...]

By: John Willson

John Willson — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 12:37:40 +0000

My old friend and Confederate, Clyde Wilson, admires the Thanksgiving feast because the first one was held, of course, in Virginia on December 4, 1619. Many of our southron friends regard claims of “New England manners” as just another Yankee imperialism. Alas, for them and the rest of us, it has become Thanksgiving, the day before Black Friday, the true beginning of “The Holidays.” Bill, we will make a toast at our extended Family table to Sarah Josepha Hale. What should we do for FDR?

By: Bob Cheeks

Bob Cheeks — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 12:10:37 +0000

Oh Lord, Thanksgiving Day, the product of consolidators! Never-the-less anti-federalist that I am, I shall continue the tradition of overeating…for peace, family, and God! Thanks Bill.