A look back at local, national and world events through Deseret News archives.

As the first president of the United States, George Washington proclaimed the first nationwide thanksgiving celebration in America, marking Nov. 26, 1789, “as a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favours of Almighty God.”

Two-hundred thirty-five years later, Thanksgiving 2024 will be celebrated this Thursday.

A look at the history books shows that in 1863, with the U.S. in the middle of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln declared that Thanksgiving would occur on the last Thursday of November.

A second presidential proclamation was issued in 1939 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, moving Thanksgiving to the second to last

See Full Page