The Billings gazette. [volume] (Billings, Mont.) 1896-1919, 1904-11-25
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From Wednesdays Daily.

From Wednesdays Daily.
Another twelve-month has passed
and we are on the eve of the day
when by proclamation we are asked
to return thanks to a Divine giver OF
all good for His kindness and benefi-
cence and the blessings v~ouchsafed us
during the year now drawing to it's
end. Thanksgiving! A simple word,
yet what thoughts and memories it re-
wives, and how more expressive per-
haps than volumes in the richness of
it's significance and meaning. To the
mind it brings pictures of assembled
households, OF reunions under the
natal roof, of families gathered and
the warm welcome that awaits the
wanderer from afar, who on this day
OF the year finds his way back to be
it only for a short time, once more
with those bound to him by ties OF
kinship and affection. 1t is a day of
religious festival for all the people.
Though fortune may not have dealt
as kindly with some of us as we may
think is our need, still we have much
to be thankful for. AS a people we
nave great cause of gratefulness.
Abundant harvests, peace at home and
peace with the world, prosperity
smiling upon us and the future unsul-
lied by any cloud to give rise to fear
or doubt as to what it may hold in
store for us. Patriotism as pure and
~unselfish as ever filled the breasts of
any nation; ideals lofty and inspiring
and ambitions noble and exalting con
tinue to animate the people and urge
them on ever to make the nation
greater and set to the world an ex-
ample of happiness and content.
Thanksgiving day is peculiarly al
American holiday, but for all that 1T
reaches deeper root in that it speaks
to all the nations of the earth in the
custom it perpetuates by giving evil
dence to them of our belief in a Su.
preme ruler and our recognition OF
His love and His providence by pub
licly returning thanks to Him.
The festival as now observed had
its origin about a year after the land.
ing of the Pilgrims On Plymouth
Rock, November 20, 1920, being the
date when the Mayfower cast anchor
off Cape Cod with it's load of men and
women who had come to the barren
wilds of America that they might be
free to worship God as they saw fit.
Despite the sufferings of that awful
first winter, the first year of the set
tlement was successful and the set
tiers found themselves fairly we'll pre-
pared for the winter that was ahead
of them. This fact appealed to the
mind OF Governor William Bradford
as a special reason for proclaiming a
day Of thanksgiving. Edward Wins
low, three times governor of the col
ony, in 1888, 1886 and 1914, writes an
account of the day. To George Nor
ton he wrote as follows:
You should understand that, in the
little time that a few of us have been
here, We have built seven dwelling
houses, and four for the use of the
plantation, and have made prepara-
lions for divers others. We set the
last spring some twenty acres of In
dian corn and sowed some six acres of
barley and peas, and, according to the
manner of the Indians, we MANFRED
the ground with herrings or other
shads, which We have in great abund-
ance and take with great EAST at our
doors. Our corn did prove well; and,
God be praised, we had a good in.
crea OF Indian corn; and our barley
~indi6erently good, but our peas not
worth gathering; for we feared they
were too late down. They came up
very well and blossomed, but the sun
parched them in the blossom.
Our harvest gotten in, u governor
sent four men on fowling, that so we
might, after q special manner, re.
joice together after we had gathered