The homework of my 7 year old daughter always reminds me that Thanksgiving is on its way: “Hey, mom, we need to camouflage the turkey so well that no hunter could ever catch it and eat it!” A piece of paper with a bird symbolizing the Holiday of Pilgrims is lying in front of me. We don’t know yet whether this poor turkey turns into a rabbit, maybe a mermaid or even a Christmas elf. We are hesitant. But when the imagination starts spinning and the air is filled with creativity-it’s always fun!
“Americans are ambiguous people”, I think to myself. “They love to eat, turkey is the main dish on every Thanksgiving table, but the Presidents have a tradition of solemn ceremony “pardoning the turkey”. And even school students compete in their ability to hide the holiday bird from the hungry people’s eyes”.
Although, it was President George Washington, who officially declared the Thanksgiving Day to be a national holiday in 1789, the tradition of “pardoning the turkey” appeared many decades later.
It is believed that the first “lucky one who got away” was the turkey sent alive to the White House in 1863 for Christmas dinner of President Abraham Lincoln’s family. His son Teddy felt sorry for the future symbol of Thanksgiving and no one ate turkey that evening.
Unfortunately, it is impossible to follow the traits of all the turkeys ever sent to the White House since there is no historical evidence that all further turkeys were pardoned for each Thanksgiving.
However, it is known that one of the favorite American Presidents —John Kennedy—showed his care for the birds by sparing a turkey four days before his assassination. The turkey born with a silver spoon in its beak, wearing a sign reading, “Good Eating Mr. President” on its neck. Kennedy said: “We’ll let this one grow” and that’s how a symbol of Thanksgiving was pardoned. However, nobody knows what happened to that bird afterwards. Its fate is vague.
Although we do know for a fact that the turkeys spared by President Richard Nixon were originally accepted as a gift by his wife Patricia but then these birds were sent to a local petting zoo or a kids-friendly farm.
In 1978, the wife of another American “turkey life saver” Jimmy Carter —Rosalynn, following the tradition set by his predecessor, sent a festive turkey to a mini zoo.
Since 1981, the practice of sending Thanksgiving turkeys away to the farms has become a tradition. And the ceremony of the turkey-gifting to Presidents turned into an inexhaustible source of satire and humor for journalists. And so it goes that they could not help but notice that on November 23, 1987, then-US President Ronald Reagan used the word “pardon” for a turkey named Charlie as a good reason to divert the reporters’ attention and deflect the unpleasant questions about the Iran-Contra affair. The bird bearing a royal name had also found its final shelter at the petting zoo.
Two years later, George W. Bush gave an entire performance entitled “How I Pardoned a Turkey”. The main audience of the play were the animal-rights activists: “Let me assure you — and this fine tom turkey — that he will not end up on anyone’s dinner table, not this guy. Allow him to live out his days on a children’s farm not far from here.”
As for President Obama, he has expanded the tradition of “pardoning the turkey” by sparing life not to one, but to two birds at once (probably this innovation is due to the fact that Obama has two daughters). So, in 2009, at the request of Sasha and Malia, two turkeys: Courage and Carolina were pardoned.
Later, in 2013, the White House website introduced a vote for the turkey that will be granted a presidential pardon. However, even the losing turkey has always been pardoned by the winner. From peaceful and witty Obama’s presidential speech of Thanksgiving 2016: “And it is my great privilege—well, it’s my privilege—actually, let’s just say it’s my job—to grant them clemency this afternoon. As I do, I want to take a moment to recognize the brave turkeys who weren’t so lucky, who didn’t get to ride the gravy train to freedom—who met their fate with courage and sacrifice—and proved that they weren’t chicken”.
In a week we will see if President Trump keeps pardoning tradition going on strong. In January 2017, almost immediately after his inauguration, Real News Right Now issued an article stating that Donald Trump had decided to execute five of sixteen turkeys previously pardoned by Obama. It turned out that the article was a satirical report rather than true news. Once again journalists joked about Trump’s habit of nullifying or denying any Obama’s achievements as the US President (such as trying bury the Obamacare health insurance for the less fortunate).
One way or another, I hope that the 2018 Thanksgiving turkey will be spared and happy to go to a petting zoo or a kid-friendly farm. My daughter and I sincerely wish for such an outcome! Our school mission is accomplished: we disguised the paper turkey into a bee, encouraging everyone to eat honey ham instead of turkey for Thanksgiving. Long live the Turkey!
Ukrainian in Philly 