A Canadian comedian traces Thanksgiving back to Martin Frobisher's 1578 survival service in Newfoundland, contrasting it with America's 1621 Plymouth story. Canada fixed the holiday on the second Monday of October in 1957, while the U.S. codified theirs in 1941 for commercial reasons. Both share turkey and family, but Canada has turnips and beaver races.
Chapters
Well, hello and Happy Thanksgiving weekend! And if you just checked the date, you're probably American. Canadian Thanksgiving, or as we call it here, Thanksgiving, is not a knockoff of the American one. We didn't look south and see the Pilgrims and say, "Let's make that but cheaper." Our holiday has its own history, and sorry Americans, but ours came first. In Canada, the Indigenous people had traditions of celebrating and giving thanks long before the Europeans showed up. But the history books will say that the earliest Canadian Thanksgiving was in 1578. Martin Frobisher, an English explorer, lands in Newfoundland, gathers his crew, and holds a service to give thanks for not dying on the Atlantic. No yams, no cranberry sauce, just survival. If you got off the boat without scurvy, you threw a party. From there, Canadian Thanksgivings popped up here and there. French settlers brought harvest festivals in the 1600s. By the 1800s, Protestant ministers in Canada were lobbying for an actual national day of thanks, which is the most Canadian form of rebellion: politely demanding permission to be grateful. In 1859, the Province of Canada held one. In 1872, we had another when the Prince of Wales recovered from typhoid. By 1879, Thanksgiving was officially recognized as an annual holiday in Canada, but the date moved around for decades. Sometimes October, sometimes November, sometimes even April. It got shifted around to avoid overlapping with Remembrance Day after the First World War. Finally, in 1957, Parliament nailed it down on the second Monday of October, and we have been pretending to like turnips ever since. As far as I can tell, the American one started around, uh, 1621 with pilgrims and the big feast at Plymouth. They added a few presidents, and by 1941, Congress declared their fourth Tuesday in November as their Thanksgiving. Later harvest, and strategically placed right before the holiday buying season. The difference isn't just our date. While our Thanksgiving is rooted in a mix of the earliest landowners and church observances and harvest traditions, it sort of always seemed to us like America's is rooted in, like, nationalism and, um, retail strategy. And high fructose corn syrup. As for our customs though, they're about the same. Family, turkey, stuffing, beaver races, back bacon carving, the ceremonial maple sauna. You know, same as you guys.
