Thanksgiving, or Thanksgiving Day, is a holiday celebrated in the United States on the fourth Thursday in November. It became an official Federal holiday in 1863, when, during theCivil War, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national day of "Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens", to be celebrated on Thursday, November 26.[1] Also, there are reports that the original Thanksgiving proclamation was signed by George Washington.[2] As a federal and public holiday in the U.S., Thanksgiving is one of the major holidays of the year. Together with Christmas and New Year, Thanksgiving is a part of the broader holiday season.
The event that Americans commonly call the "First Thanksgiving" was celebrated by thePilgrims after their first harvest in the New World in 1621.[3] This feast lasted three days, and it was attended by 90 Native Americans (as accounted by attendee Edward Winslow)[4] and 53 Pilgrims.[5] The New England colonists were accustomed to regularly celebrating "thanksgivings"—days of prayer thanking God for blessings such as military victory or the end of a drought.[6]