Thanksgiving has long marked the end of autumn and the unofficial start of the holiday season. Businesses and schools close so that families can join in a feast rooted in American tradition. It’s the last deep breath vefore the crush of holiday shopping begins.
The holiday had been celebrated on the last Thursday in November ever since President Lincoln’s 1863 proclamation of “a national day of Thanksgiving and praise.”
And there Thanksgiving remained for decades, right where Lincoln had left it,