|
Sarah also continued her independent writing and editing career.
Her publications ranged from Flora’s Interpreter, containing images of
flowers with uplifting American poems, to Woman's record; or
sketches of all distinguished women from "the beginning"
till A.D. 1850 (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1853). She
also edited a number of best-selling poetic "gift books"
with decorative title pages.
|
|
|
 |
Flora’s interpreter: or, the
American book of flowers
and sentiments.
Boston: Marsh Capen
& Lyon, 1833. |
The white veil: a bridal gift.
Edited
by Mrs. Sarah Josepha
Hale. Philadelphia: E.H. Butler
& Co., 1854. |
The poet's
offering for 1850.
Edited by Sarah Josepha Hale.
Philadelphia: Grigg Elliott & Co.,
1850. |
Sarah also wrote cookbooks, such as
The
Good Housekeeper, or The Way to Live Well and to Be Well While We Live,
and children's books.
|
|
Spring flowers,
or the poetical bouquet: easy, pleasing and moral rhymes and
pieces of poetry for children. Edited by Mrs. S.J.
Hale. New York: Edwd. Dunigan, perhaps 1835?
"Mary" not only had a lamb, she had a
bird!
"Perhaps you're not happy, perhaps
you're not well:
I wish you could speak, that your
griefs you might tell;
It vexes me quite thus to see you
in sorrow;
Good bye; and I hope you'll be
better tomorrow." |
Sarah also wrote editorials.
The first year of her editorship, 1837, Sarah wrote the first of her
Thanksgiving editorials. Praising
the holiday for its domestic and moral influence, she suggested that
it
| “might, without
inconvenience, be observed on the same day of November, say the last
Thursday in the month, throughout all New England; and also in our
sister states, who have engrafted it upon their
social system. It would
then have a national character, which would, eventually, induce all
the states to join in the commemoration of “In-gathering,” which
it celebrates. It is a festival which will never become obsolete, for it
cherishes the best affections of the heart – the social and domestic
ties. It calls together
the dispersed members of the family circle, and brings plenty, joy and
gladness to the dwellings of the poor and lowly.”
|
Sarah did not introduce the topic again until 1842, when she used the
example of Thanksgiving to favorably compare New England to “Old”
England:
| “At this season
every family, almost, in our land has the comforts of life, and nearly
all have the hope and prospect of living thus comfortably through the
coming seasons. In Old
England it is not so. Thousands,
aye, million of her people are suffering daily from the ‘want of all
things!’
|
Sarah’s
crusade for a national Thanksgiving really began in 1847, when she
noted that
| “The
Governor of New Hampshire has appointed Thursday, November 25th, as
the day of annual thanksgiving in that state. We hope every governor
in the twenty-nine states
will appoint the same day -- 25th of November -- as the
day of thanksgiving! Then
the whole land would rejoice at once.”
|
This was followed by editorials in 1848 (there were two that year!)
and 1849. After a
one-year gap in 1850, Sarah resumed her Thanksgiving editorials,
continuing without interruption for more than 20 years.
As Sarah noted in one of her 1848 editorials
| “the
appointment of the [Thanksgiving] day rests with the governors of each
state; and hitherto, though the day of the week was always Thursday,
that of the months had been varied.
But the last Thursday of last November [1847] was kept as
Thanksgiving Day in twenty-four of the twenty-nine states -- all that
kept such a feast at all. May
the last Thursday of the next November witness this glad and glorious
festival, this ‘feast of the ingathering of harvest,’ extended
over our whole land, from the St. Johns to the Rio Grande, from the
Plymouth Rock to the Sunset Sea.”
|
Sarah’s crusade was, therefore, two-fold.
She wanted every governor of every state or territory to
proclaim a Thanksgiving Day and she wanted that day to be uniform
throughout America. Then,
as she proclaimed in 1851, “There would then be two great American
national festivals, Independence Day, on the Fourth of July, and
Thanksgiving Day, on the last Thursday in November.”
She explained her choice of the last Thursday in November in
this way
| “The
last Thursday in November
has these advantages -- harvests of all kinds are gathered in --
summer travellers have returned to their homes -- the diseases that,
during summer and early autumn, often afflict some portions of our
country, have ceased, and all are prepared to enjoy a day of Thanksgiving.”
|
Several strong themes carried throughout Sarah’s campaign.
One was the
importance of Thanksgiving’s religious connotations:
| "THE FOURTH OF
JULY is the exponent of independence and civil freedom.
THANKSGIVING DAY is the national pledge of Christian faith in
God, acknowledging him as the dispenser of blessings. These two festivals should be joyfully and universally
observed throughout our whole country, and thus incorporated in our
habits of thought as inseparable from American life.” (1852)
|
Another was Thanksgiving’s role in unifying a geographically
far-flung nation:
| “it would be
better to have the day so fixed by the expression of public sentiment
that no discord would be possible, but, from Maine to Mexico, from
Plymouth Rock to Sunset Sea, the hymn of thanksgiving should be
simultaneously raised, as the pledge of brotherhood in the enjoyment
of God’s blessings during the year.“ (1854)
|
As years passed,
Sarah’s editorials emphasized ever more strongly the unifying role
that Thanksgiving could play within an increasingly divided nation. In 1859, she rhapsodized
| “We
are already spread and mingled over the Union.
Each year, by bringing us oftener together, releases us from
the estrangement and coolness consequent on distance and political
alienations; each year multiplies our ties of relationship and
friendship. How can we
hate our Mississippi brother-in-law?
and who is a better fellow than our wife’s uncle from St.
Louis? If Maine itself be
a great way off, and almost nowhere, on the contrary, a dozen splendid
fellows hail from Kennebec County, and your wife is a down-Easter.”
|
That
year, 32 states and territories, plus the District of Columbia,
celebrated Thanksgiving on the last Thursday in November.
In 1860, she
wrote
| “Everything
that contributes to bind us in one vast empire together, to quicken
the sympathy that makes us feel from the icy North to the sunny South
that we are one family, each a member of a great and free Nation, not
merely the unit of a remote locality, is worthy of being cherished.
We have sought to reawaken and increase this sympathy,
believing that the fine filaments of the affections are stronger than
laws to keep the Union of our States sacred in the hearts of our
people… We believe our Thanksgiving Day, if fixed and perpetuated,
will be a great and sanctifying promoter of this national spirit.”
|
Sarah’s hopes
were, of course, not to be fulfilled.
In 1861, the bombardment of Fort Sumter opened the Civil War.
Sarah
reported that, in 1861,
| “this
National Feast Day was celebrated in twenty-four States and three
Territories; all these, excepting the States of Massachusetts and
Maine, held the Festival on the same day the
last Thursday in November. “
The “missing” states were, of course, those of the
Confederacy.
|
Sarah did not
give up the fight. Instead,
she tried a different strategy. As
she suggested in her 1863 editorial
“Would
it not be of great advantage, socially, nationally, religiously, to
have the DAY of our American Thanksgiving positively settled? Putting aside the sectional feelings and local incidents that
might be urged by any single State or isolated Territory that desired
to choose its own time, would it not be more noble, more truly
American, to become nationally
in unity when we offer to God our tribute of joy and gratitude for
the blessings of the year?
Taking
this view of the case, would it not be better that the proclamation
which appoints Thursday the 26th of November (1863) as the day of
Thanksgiving for the people of the United States of America should, in
the first instance, emanate from the President of the Republic to be
applied by the Governors of each and every State, in acquiescence with
the chief executive adviser?”
|
Sarah’s questions were rhetorical.
On September 28, 1863, Sarah Josepha Hale had written to President
Abraham Lincoln. The
letter is preserved in the
Papers
of Abraham Lincoln at the Library of Congress.
In it she wrote
|
”As the President of the United States has the power of appointments
for the District of Columbia and the Territories; also for the Army
and Navy and all American citizens abroad who claim protection from
the U. S. Flag -- could he not, with right as well as duty, issue his
proclamation for a Day of National Thanksgiving for all the above
classes of persons? And would it not be fitting and patriotic for him
to appeal to the Governors of all the States, inviting and commending
these to unite in issuing proclamations for the last Thursday in
November as the Day of Thanksgiving for the people of each State? Thus
the great Union Festival of America would be established.”
|
Sarah Josepha’s petition brought the result she was seeking.
On October 3, Lincoln issued a proclamation that urged
Americans to observe the last Thursday in November as a day of
Thanksgiving.
Click HERE for
the text of Sarah Josepha’s letter to Lincoln.
Click HERE for
Abraham Lincoln’s Thanksgiving proclamation.
Abraham Lincoln issued another Thanksgiving proclamation the
following year, 1864.
And Sarah Josepha, now that she had achieved two proclamations, could
introduce a becoming note of
modesty
| “In
our endeavors, which have been continued for many years, to secure the
recognition of one day
throughout the land as the Day of public Thanksgiving, we are
conscious of not having in any manner gone beyond the proper limits of
the sphere which we have prescribed for the Lady’s Book.
It is the peculiar happiness of Thanksgiving Day that nothing
political mingles in its observance.
It is in its very nature a religious and domestic holiday.
It belongs to the altar and the hearth, at which woman should
ever be present; and the women
of our country should take this day under their peculiar charge, and
sanctify it to acts of piety, charity, and domestic love.”
|
The 1865 editorial was triumphal
once again as Sarah wrote
“President
[Andrew] Johnson has a happier lot [than President Abraham Lincoln].
His voice can reach all American citizens.
From East to West, from North to South, the whole country will
be moved at his bidding; at home or abroad, on sea or land, the
appointed day will be welcomed as the seal of national peace and the
harbinger of national blessings.
Thus
our own ideal of an AMERICAN THANKSGIVING FESTIVAL* will be realized,
as we described it in 1860. The
30th of November, 1865, will bring the consummation.
On that DAY our citizens, whether in their own pleasant homes,
or in the distant regions of Oriental despotism, would observe it on
board every ship where our flag floats there would be a day of
gladness wherever our missionaries preach the Gospel of “goodwill to
men,” the day would exemplify the joy of Christians; and in our Great
Republic, from the St. John’s to the Rio Grande, from the Atlantic
to the Pacific, all our people, as one Brotherhood, will rejoice
together, and give thanks to God for our National, State, and Family
blessings."
|
Sarah was, perhaps, being a bit disingenuous.
Andrew Johnson had, in fact, NOT proclaimed Thanksgiving for
the 30th of November – instead, he proclaimed
Thanksgiving to be the first Thursday in December!
Sarah soldiered on, however, and the following years Andrew
Johnson proclaimed Thanksgiving to be the last Thursday in November.
Sarah was not content to rest on her laurels for long.
In 1871, she launched a further crusade – to have the
national Thanksgiving Day proclaimed not by the President but by an
act of Congress.
|
“It
is eminently fit that this National Holiday shall rest upon the same
legal basis as its companions, the Twenty-second of February and the
Fourth of July. As things
now stand, our Thanksgiving is exposed to the chances of the time. Unless the President or the Governor of the State in office
happens to see fit, no day is appointed for its observance. Is not this a state of things which calls for instant remedy?
Should not our festival be assured to us by law?
We
hope to see, before many months have elapsed, perhaps before our next
Thanksgiving, the passage of an act by Congress appointing the last
Thursday in November as a perpetual holiday, wherein the whole nation
may unite in praise to Almighty God for his bounty and love, in
rejoicing over the blessings of the year, in the union of families,
and in acts of charity and kindness to the poor.”
|
By
this time, however, Sarah’s energy and her influence were beginning
to wane. She was 83 years
old. Godey’s Lady’s
Book was being overtaken by newer publications.
Sarah’s insistence on not ruffling her readers’ feathers
had resulted in a peculiar silence on the subject of the Civil War.
Ultimately, it made Godey’s less relevant to the women of
America. Nevertheless,
Sarah continued to write Thanksgiving editorials until 1875.
The joy of her later years was the discovery that one of her
personal heroes, George Washington, had issued a presidential
Thanksgiving proclamation in 1789 – for the last Thursday in
November.
Sarah Josepha
Hale died in 1879, at age 91.
Seventy
years after the launch, in 1871, of Sarah’s second Crusade – to
have the national Thanksgiving Day proclaimed not by the President but
by an act of Congress –
the
U.S. Senate and House of Representatives passed a bill establishing
that Thanksgiving would occur annually on the fourth Thursday of
November. On November 26,
1941, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the bill into law.
Click HERE to read the
full text of all of Sarah Josepha Hale's Thanksgiving editorials in
Godey's Lady's Book.
|
