The Following is an encore presentation of Everything Everywhere Daily.

On the 4th Thursday, November every year,

American celebrate the holiday of Thanksgiving.

It's a holiday that originated in the Americas,

but has subsequently spread to many other countries around the world.

It's a holiday that's actually secular,

but with some religious overtones,

and has a unique set of traditions that aren't really shared with any other holiday.

Learn more about the history and traditions of Thanksgiving on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. everything everywhere daily. Tradition tells us that the first Thanksgiving was held in 1621 when the pilgrims who lived in Plymouth Colony, Massachusetts held a feast of

Thanksgiving with a group of local Indians. There were turkeys and of course the pilgrims had

big hats with buckles on them and everyone lived happily ever after.

As is so often the case with historical legends, there's often a kernel of truth with a whole lot of embellishment which accrued over the years.

So with that, let's try to unpack the truth about the holiday we call Thanksgiving

and the traditions behind it. For starters, the first Thanksgiving probably wasn't the first

Thanksgiving, as in it wasn't the first time a feast or

celebration of Thanksgiving occurred in North America. There were recorded

celebrations of Thanksgiving in Virginia in 1607 and the Spanish settlement of St. Augustine, Florida in 1565.

There's even a story of explorer Martin Froshbier celebrating a Thanksgiving on Baffin Island in the far north of Canada in 1579.

Not only that, but the 1621 feast held by the Pilgrims was never called a Thanksgiving in any of the accounts of the event.

In fact, this first Thanksgiving that we've built up so much of our

mythology around was barely given a mention in the written accounts of the colony.

Here is one of the only accounts of what we call the first Thanksgiving by Edward Winslow, who was one of the original Mayflower pilgrims.

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