Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com
Football and the
Several First Thanksgivings
In 1863 President Lincoln established the annual observance
of Thanksgiving in honor of the Union victory at Gettysburg (President
Lincoln proclaims official Thanksgiving holiday - HISTORY). Over the following
decades the holiday was backfilled with stories and histories of questionable
accuracy, moving the focus back from Gettysburg to Plymouth Colony, but a
holiday dedicated to gratitude for God’s blessings is always good anyway.
Without a football game between the University of Texas and
Texas A & M the days loses much of its meaning, though. Sniff.
Different groups claim that the dinner-on-the-grounds at
Plymouth was not the first Thanksgiving. Texas, being Texas, claims TWO first
Thanksgivings [The First
Thanksgiving? | TX Almanac (texasalmanac.com)]:
1541 – the expedition of Francisco Vazquez de Coronado in
May in Palo Duro Canyon and
1598 – the expedition of Juan de Onate at San Elizario. No
one, including the Spanish government, gave thanks for Onate when his mass
murders were finally reported.
San Augustin / Saint Augustine, Florida claims yet another
first Thanksgiving [The
First Thanksgiving - Castillo de San Marcos National Monument (U.S. National
Park Service) (nps.gov)]:
1564 – the expedition of Pedro Menendez de Aviles and 800
settlers.
Most of the images show the First Nations participating in
the several first Thanksgiving, which is ironic – it’s as if someone shows up
at your house uninvited, cooks your food, and then invites you to sit at your
own table and at the foot, not at the head.
But all nations appear to have migration stories, and so
almost every group has displaced other groups and each has been displaced in
its turn. The one exception I know (and I am wonderfully ignorant) are the
Acoma of what is known at the present as New Mexico. The Acoma maintain that
their ancestors came from the earth right there, not somewhere else, and that
is a rare historical narrative indeed.
Other Europeans who colonized part of what is now the U.S.A.
include:
France – 1524
Holland – 1615
Sweden – 1638
Russia – 1732
Presumably they too had their own first Thanksgivings, so
metaphorically there should be room at the table for everyone and at almost any
time of the year.
Maybe the only matter upon which all agree is that any
Thanksgiving should include a football game.
Every culture on the planet played forms of football from prehistory and
it was a biggie in this hemisphere. Thus, playing any kind of football game on
Thanksgiving is a very Meso-American thing to do.
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