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Did you know goats might have contributed milk and cheese to the first Thanksgiving feast? It’s true. The first Thanksgiving took place at Plimoth Plantation in Plymouth, Mass., in 1621. There were animals onboard the Mayflower and historians think some might have been goats. Otherwise, they came to Plymouth soon after that because a document called the Plymouth Colony Division of Livestock issued in 1647 mentions 22 “shee goats.”
President George Washington proclaimed the first official Thanksgiving Day in 1786, but it didn’t become an annual event until 1863 when President Abraham Lincoln made it so. In 1941, President Franklin Roosevelt signed a bill into law making Thanksgiving fall on the fourth Thursday every November.
We’re thankful for lots of things this year:
- Salem is thankful he didn’t eat any more yummy acorns than he did.
- Big Mama, Bon Bon and Jadzia are thankful for the beautiful babies I helped them make this year. (I am such a studly guy!)
- Sam the lamb is thankful for the milk Mom fed him after his real mama died, and for Miss Maple and Cordelia, who are his friends and slept with him and kept him warm.
- The rams are thankful it’s rut and they have an excuse to make goo-goo eyes at the ewes and bash their heads together all the time. (What showoffs!) The ewes are thankful we have strong fences.
- And Mom and I are thankful we write things for Hobby Farms and for all of you nice people who read my column every week.
Happy Thanksgiving! Here’s hoping you get pumpkin pie slivers, too!
