You can find all kinds of interesting things in the Texas Digital
Newspaper Collection of The Portal to Texas History. Who knew:
Prior to the 1940s, Thanksgiving was a holiday declared each year by
presidential proclamation. State governors then chose whether to observe
the holiday in their own states. Controversy ensued in 1939 when
President Roosevelt selected a non-traditional date for Thanksgiving.
In 1939, Texans observed Thanksgiving both on November 23, as declared
by President Roosevelt, and on November 30, the traditional “last
Thursday.”
Borger Daily Herald (Borger, Tex.), Vol. 14, No. 1, Ed. 1 Thursday,
November 23, 1939, p. 1
Citizens of Tulia, Texas were firmly in favor of the traditional date.
The Tulia Herald (Tulia, Tex), Vol. 30, No. 46, Ed. 1, Thursday,
November 16, 1939, p. 1
Students at Howard Payne College reasoned that Thanksgiving should be
celebrated for the entire week from November 23 to November 30.
The Yellow Jacket (Brownwood, Tex.), Vol. 26, No. 10, Ed. 1, Thursday,
November 23, 1939, p. 2
Two years later, in December 1941, Congress passed a joint resolution
officially establishing Thanksgiving Day as a legal public holiday to be
observed on the fourth Thursday in November each year. President
Roosevelt signed the measure into law on December 26, 1941. (See 1941
Cong Rec 10130 and 55 Stat 862.) Apparently, a new federal holiday
wasn’t big news compared to the start of World War II. We have been
unable to find any mention of the Thanksgiving legislation in our
newspaper collection.
The Texas Digital Newspaper Collection in The Portal to Texas History
contains more than 109,000 historic newspaper issues. Find more about
Thanksgiving at
https://texashistory.unt.edu/explore/collections/TDNP/browse/?q=thanksgiving&t=fulltext.
–submitted by Nancy Reis, Publications Specialist, Digital Libraries Division
Photograph: [A turkey looks at the camera] by José L. Castillo https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth24004/
