Public Media from Michigan State University
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The First Official Thanksgiving

Mon Nov. 21 at 9:00PM on WKAR World 23.2 | Most people think that Thanksgiving was first observed by the Pilgrims in 1621. It wasn’t.

"The First Official Thanksgiving" tells the story of what some historians might call the first "official, English-speaking" Thanksgiving held in the Americas. At a meeting in London in 1618, Sir William Throckmorton, George Thorpe, John Smyth and Richard Berkeley gathered to form the Berkeley Company and discuss a land grant in the new world, given to them by King James I.

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