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Thanksgiving 2014

I remember, as a boy, hearing my social studies and history teachers recite the oft-repeated sentiment that those who forget history are doomed to repeat it.  And while I would not classify myself as a student of history, I do enjoy looking back at times and learning how history has affected our contemporary life.

One of the first things that come to mind when I hear “Thanksgiving” is “Black Friday.”  I confess that I have arisen early to participate in the glutinous shopping representative of this day, both feared and adored by retailers.  But, there must be something more to Thanksgiving than being a day of rest and preparation for the mayhem of America’s busiest shopping day.

On October 3, 1863, Abraham Lincoln read a proclamation that declared the last Thursday of November as a day of Thanksgiving.  I did not know that for some time before that, a journalist named Sarah Josepha Hale had prodded President Lincoln toward establishing Thanksgiving as a “fixed and national” holiday.  I also did not realize that it was William Seward, Lincoln’s Secretary of State, who wrote the proclamation that President Lincoln read to the American people on that day 151 years ago.

As years have come and gone since that time, much has changed and much has remained the same.  Please take a moment and read that presidential proclamation and consider how the holiday of Thanksgiving changes you.

Best Regards,

– Ed

Washington, D.C.
October 3, 1863

By the President of the United States of America.

A Proclamation.

The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequaled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship; the axe has enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consiousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom. No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and one voice by the whole American People. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to His tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquillity and Union.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the City of Washington, this Third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the Unites States the Eighty-eighth.

By the President: Abraham Lincoln

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Dr. James Burneson

Our practice is working together to realize a shared vision of uncompromising excellence in dentistry.

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