This month being November, Thanksgiving is, of course, foremost on our chefs’ minds. In WABE’s series “Atlanta’s Savory Stories,” our food contributors Akila McConnell and food historian and chef Asata Reid bring us histories and recommendations from Atlanta’s diverse culinary landscape. Reid and McConnell delivered a whole cornucopia of discussion topics from Thanksgiving culinary histories to recipe tips and personal favorites.
McConnell clued listeners into a lesser-known Thanksgiving origin story. “In 1789, the country was just formed. President George Washington issued the very first Thanksgiving proclamation, which created a day of public thanksgiving and prayer,” McConnell explained. But for 74 years, states and cities set their own dates for Thanksgiving, resulting in scattered, marginally popular holiday observances.
“The push for a national day of Thanksgiving came from one woman, and that woman was editor Sarah J. Hale of the ‘Godey’s Ladies’ Book,'” McConnell said. An educator in the domestic arts, a strong abolitionist and what Reid heard a Tik-Tokker refer to as “the Martha Stewart of her time,” Hale felt the unstable pre-Civil War United States needed to unite around a particular, nationally accepted day of Thanksgiving.
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