Here we are. It’s Thanksgiving once again, and for the past few months, our families have been putting their time and energy –never mind spending lots of money– into making preparations for the annual Thanksgiving dinner. Typical dinner consists of potatoes, cranberries, yams, some type of vegetables, rolls or bread, and, of course, the turkey.
Did you know that 46 million turkeys are eaten each Thanksgiving holiday to which consumption has increased by 104% since 1970? The slaughter of turkeys doesn’t just happen around Thanksgiving time. These birds are killed months before and kept frozen in warehouses to then be distributed to local supermarkets. This is to avoid overloading the machines and labor costs during the holiday season.
Did you also know that every year a turkey is pardoned by a President? Pardoning of the Thanksgiving turkey is actually called “National Thanksgiving Turkey Presentation.” This has become a tradition where the President of the United States will pardon a turkey (or sometimes two) from being slaughtered and used for Thanksgiving dinner. These turkeys are then moved to a farm or other location where they will spend the rest of their natural lives.
In the late 1800’s, private Citizens would donate turkeys to the President every year as gifts. It is said that the official presentation to pardon a turkey started in 1947 with President Harry Truman, but there are no records that he had actually pardoned turkeys. Under the Truman Administration, in an effort to conserve grain for foreign aid campaigns, the presentation was borne out of a lobbying campaign to promote “Meatless Tuesdays” and “Poultry-less Thursdays.” Truman had admitted to eating some of the turkeys that were donated. It has also been stated that the Presidents who followed also ate the turkeys that were donated to them.
The very first President to have pardoned turkeys was Ronald Reagan in 1982, and he sent them to farms or the zoo. But his last year in office, he did not take part in the pardoning. His successor, President George H. W. Bush, has made the pardoning of the turkey a permanent part of the presentation in 1989.
President Bush would send these turkeys to various farms around the nation, as well as estates, Disneyland, and Disney World, where they served as the Honorary Grand Marshals for the Thanksgiving Day Parade.
Because these turkeys were overfed before they were pardoned, they only lived a year or two after their pardon. As time moved forward the life span has increased.
Here is a list of most of the pardoned: Charlie, Harry, Jerry, in 2001 Liberty and Freedom, Katie (who is the first female to be pardoned), Stars and Stripes, Marshmallow and Yam, Pumpkin and Pecan, Flyer and Fryer, May and Flower, Courage, Apple, another Liberty, Cobbler and Gobbler, Popcorn (who won an online contest over his identically sized stablemate Caramel who was also pardoned), Franklin, Mac and Cheese, Abe, Tatar and Tot, Drumstick and Wishbone.
Not only do our Presidents pardon Turkeys every year at the White House, but some states have also jumped on the pardoning bandwagon such as New York, Pennsylvania and Minnesota to name just a few.
This Thanksgiving, when you sit down to have dinner with your family, think about those turkeys that have sacrificed their lives so we can have a nice Thanksgiving dinner and honor those who have been pardoned.
