Honor Thanksgiving’s founder

We have a Thanksgiving holiday because Sarah Josepha Hale of New Hampshire was a great and persistent writer. We should honor her legacy by using our own pen to make a difference on Thanksgiving Day.

In the mid-1800s Hale took up the cause of making a national Thanksgiving holiday to unite the country. Previously there had been sporadic Thanksgiving celebrations but not the national holiday we enjoy today.

Sarah started writing about Thanksgiving in magazines and through letters. In 1863 Sarah wrote to President Abraham Lincoln "You may have observed that, for some years past, there has been an increasing interest felt in our land to have the Thanksgiving held on the same day, in all the States; it now needs National recognition and authoritive fixation, only, to become permanently, an American custom and institution."

Sarah encouraged Lincoln to use his influence to make Thanksgiving happen.

President Lincoln did just that issuing a Thanksgiving Day proclamation in October of 1863. This was during the Civil War and Thanksgiving was seen as a day to pray for peace, unity and healing.

President Lincoln proclaimed on Oct. 3, 1863 "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 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."

Let’s honor Sarah’s spirit by each of us writing a letter to the president and Congress about feeding the world’s hungry.

Many people on this day are starving in war-torn Sudan, Yemen, Afghanistan, Somalia, Gaza, Haiti, D.R. Congo, Burkina Faso and many others. You could write to your elected officials about the importance of food aid.

You could use your pen on Thanksgiving Day, writing to your elected officials about supporting the U.N. World Food Program and other hunger relief agencies.

So take a few moments on Thanksgiving Day to write, in honor of Sarah Josepha Hale, a letter about feeding the world’s hungry. Your words can lead to food for those who desperately need it.

William Lambers partnered with the U.N. World Food Program on the book “Ending World Hunger.”