HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!

The following is excerpted from a transcript of the Rush Limbaugh show on Wednesday in which, as is his custom, he recounts the story of the First Thanksgiving. Rush has a wonderful way of conveying the history that many of us are never taught. I hope you find the time to read it in full, as well as the proclamation by our first president designating this national holiday. You can read the Rush transcript here:

…”On August 1, 1620, the Mayflower set sail. It carried a total of 102 passengers, including forty Pilgrims led by William Bradford. On the journey, Bradford set up an agreement, a contract, that established,” essentially socialism, “just and equal laws for all members of the new community, irrespective of their religious beliefs. Where did the revolutionary ideas expressed in the Mayflower Compact come from? From the Bible. The Pilgrims were a people completely steeped in the lessons of the Old and New Testaments.

“They looked to the ancient Israelites for their example. And, because of the biblical precedents set forth in Scripture, they never doubted that their experiment would work.” They were people with incredible faith. “The journey to the New World was a long and arduous one. And when the Pilgrims landed in New England in November, they found, according to Bradford’s detailed journal, a cold, barren, desolate wilderness. There were no friends to greet them, he wrote. There were no houses to shelter them.

“There were no inns where they could refresh themselves. And the sacrifice they had made for freedom was just beginning. During the first winter, half the Pilgrims — including Bradford’s own wife — died of either starvation, sickness or exposure. When spring finally came, Indians,” the Native Americans, indeed, “taught the settlers how to plant corn, fish for cod and skin beavers for coats. Life improved for the Pilgrims, but they did not yet prosper! This is important to understand because this is where modern American history lessons often end.”

That’s where the traditional story of Thanksgiving ends: The Indians helped ’em and they learned how to plant corn, had they had a big feast, and that’s what we celebrate today. No! “Thanksgiving is actually explained in [way too many] textbooks as a holiday for which the Pilgrims gave thanks to the Indians for saving their lives, rather than” what it was. Thanksgiving was “a devout expression of gratitude” to God — and if you doubt that, go look at George Washington’s first Thanksgiving Proclamation, when Thanksgiving became a national holiday because of George Washington.

You can read a transcript of George Washington’s Thanksgiving Proclamation here. It begins:

Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor—and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me “to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.”

Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be…

May our nation continue to be blessed. And from our homes to yours…may all of you, our faithful friends and family, have a wonderful Thanksgiving day…Jack and Tina