By Joe Bullick

As October fades into the sunset, taking with it the autumn leaves and Indian summer, November arrives with its shorter days and bare trees.  This month brings one of the most important holidays of the year, Thanksgiving Day.  It was first celebrated in 1621 to commemorate the harvest reaped by the Plymouth Colony after a harsh winter.  In that year, Gov. William Bradford proclaimed a day of Thanksgiving and invited the local Wampanoag tribe for a feast. 

In 1863, President Lincoln proclaimed that the last Thursday in November would be a national day of thanksgiving.  In 1941 Thanksgiving was finally sanctioned by congress as a legal holiday and established it on the fourth Thursday in November. 

This is the day when families get together to celebrate with their loved ones—young and old.  As a young boy living in a farming area, I was grateful for all the things I had.  Back then local churches and farmers often made apple butter late in Oct. and in early Nov.  In the old days, they used the whole apple rather than applesauce.  They poured a little cider in the bottom of the kettle, added the apples and cooked them all day in order to make them soft enough to turn them into apple butter.  Now we cheat by using applesauce, sometimes from a can.

Thanksgiving provides an opportunity for us to reflect.  There is so much hubbub leading up to Christmas that it is sometimes easy to miss the beauty of Thanksgiving.  We must not forget those who don’t have families to eat with or a place to live.  My mother always gave to the Red Cross and Salvation Army.  The Salvation Army began in 1865 when William Booth, a London minister, decided to take his message into the streets, where it would reach the poor, the homeless and the hungry.  Today, the Salvation Army is in more than 106 nations.  The Red Cross aids millions of people and began in 1859.  We have to thank Clara Barton who was the first to establish a lasting Red Cross society in America.  This is also a time also to remember our local food banks. 

I hope you and your family enjoy one of the greatest holidays of the year.  God Bless!

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Joe welcomes any ideas, suggestions or interesting stories.
Email him at northcon@nauticom.net. Please put "Town Crier" in the subject line of your email.

To contact Joe to schedule an appointment to tour his museum at McKnight Elementary School, call the Northern Connection office at (724) 940-2444 or email northcon@nauticom.net. Please put "Museum Tour" in the subject line.

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