What was the main course at the first thanksgiving

Thanksgiving dinner: never has the history of a meal been so obscured by myth. Every year on the fourth Thursday in November, Americans sit down to eat with family and friends. Some gather to give thanks for all that they have received over the previous year; others get together just to enjoy turkey and football. We all celebrate Thanksgiving in our own ways.

So what do most Americans believe happened on that first Thanksgiving Day? Most still cling to what they learned in elementary school. The Pilgrims sat down with Indians for a big meal of turkey, cornbread, cranberries and pumpkin pie. The Pilgrims dressed in black, and the Indians wore feathers and colorful beads. In fact, many Americans today still recall if they were “pilgrims” or “Indians” in their school pageants.

It’s a charming story, but it’s a myth. To be sure, it’s a powerful one — one that will be repeated many times this November. The fact that it’s so pervasive is evidence that American myths have long lives.

So what are the facts of that first Thanksgiving? In fact, the Pilgrims of the Plymouth Colony in today’s Massachusetts did share a meal with the Wampanoag Indians in the autumn of 1621, but the rest of the details are uncertain. The only documentary evidence of the event comes from the journal of Plymouth Colony’s governor, Edward Winslow, who noted simply that the colonists met with Chief Massasoit and 90 of his men for a feast that lasted four days. No one worried about cholesterol or obesity in 1621!

Though they don’t have much evidence, historians and archaeologists do have an educated hypothesis of what the Pilgrims ate, how they ate, when they ate and what they wore at that first Thanksgiving meal. The historical facts are not at all like the scene usually painted in elementary school.

Start with the menu. It’s not likely that the Pilgrims and the Indians consumed any bread dressing, mashed potatoes or pumpkin pie. In fact, it is not likely that they ate any roast turkey either. The only items listed in Winslow’s journal were “venison and wild fowl,” and it is likely that dried corn and fruit filled out the bill of fare. In colonial times, a person ate what was available, when it was available. No one back then saved room for pumpkin pie.

Another myth has to do with how the meal was served. The Pilgrims and the Indians did not, as the myth has it, sit down at tables, bless their food or pass the serving dishes. It’s more likely that food was set out on every available flat surface: tables, boxes, benches, and tree stumps. The meal was consumed without ceremony over three days, whenever someone was hungry.

No one used plates or eating utensils. Although both the colonists and the Indians occasionally used cloths or napkins if the food was hot, they usually ate with their hands. And not everyone ate everything that was served. Most diners ate what they liked or whatever dish was closest to them.

Finally, it’s important to dispel one last Thanksgiving myth — that the Pilgrims dressed in black and white clothing, wore pointed hats and starched bonnets and favored buckles on their shoes. It’s true that they dressed in black on Sundays; but on most days, including the first Thanksgiving, they dressed in white, beige, black, green and brown. And it’s likely that the Indians were fully clothed to ward off the chill of autumn in New England. Who would wear only a loincloth in Massachusetts in November?

So it’s a good thing that Americans today are not tested on the history of that first Thanksgiving, because few of us would earn a passing grade. It seems that the historical evidence of Thanksgiving is not as compelling as the myths that cloud our memories. It’s too bad that childhood images of Pilgrims and Indians aren’t based on historical facts.

And yet there’s a legacy about this holiday that threads its way from past to the present and defies both myth and historical evidence. That legacy is generosity. To be sure, Americans today may not be as religious as the Pilgrims, but most Americans do share their plenty with their family and friends on this special day. It’s a holiday that brings all Americans, no matter their creed or disposition, together. And that’s something worthy of our thanks.

Timothy Walch is director emeritus of the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library in West Branch, Iowa, and the editor of "At the President's Side: The Vice Presidency in the Twentieth Century" (1997).

Every year in November, many people in the United States gather with family for a giant feast. The traditional meal includes turkey, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes with marshmallows, glazed carrots, green bean casserole, macaroni and cheese, rolls—you name it. All the things the first Pilgrims and the native Wampanoag ate back in the year 1621, right?

Of course, we know that isn’t exactly accurate. For one thing, macaroni and cheese is definitely not a traditional Thanksgiving food, nor did the Pilgrims and Wampanoag have oven-safe dishes for baking green-bean casseroles. Or marshmallows. So, what did the Pilgrims eat during that very first Thanksgiving? Let’s take a deeper dive. The answers might surprise you.

1. Turkey

There’s a good chance the Pilgrims and Wampanoag did in fact eat turkey as part of that very first Thanksgiving. Wild turkey was a common food source for people who settled Plymouth. In the days prior to the celebration, the colony’s governor sent four men to go “fowling”—that is, to hunt for birds. Did they come back with any turkey? We don’t know for sure, but probably. At the very least, we know there was a lot of meat, since the native Wampanoag people who celebrated with the Pilgrims added five deer to the menu.  

2. Mashed Potatoes

Keep dreaming. At the time the Pilgrims celebrated their first Thanksgiving, most Europeans had never even seen a potato, let alone learned to mash them and drown them in gravy. Same goes for the Wampanoag. The history of the potato is as long as it is glorious and deserves its own article, to be sure. But to make a long story short, potatoes come from the high Andes of South America and weren’t really cultivated in North America until the 1700s. So, no, cross it off your list—mashed potatoes are not an original Thanksgiving side dish.

3. Cranberry Sauce

By fall 1621, the Pilgrims were essentially out of sugar. Translation—no cranberry sauce. Even with sugar, the Pilgrims still wouldn’t have used it to sauce cranberries. That’s because the tart little berry was new to them. Native Americans made dyes out of cranberries. But the day when the first man or woman would combine sweetened cranberries with a mouthful of stuffing, gravy, mashed potatoes, and white turkey breast in one satisfying, jaw-stretching bite was somewhere in the future.

4. Corn

It’s very, very likely the Pilgrims and Wampanoag ate corn for the first Thanksgiving—but not the frozen kind that you heat up in the microwave (obviously). Nor was it the boiled kind, the cobbed kind, the pudding kind, or the cornbread kind with little bits of sausage in it that only your great-aunt Suzie knows how to make. The corn the Pilgrims and Wampanoag most likely ate for dinner that day was the mushy, turned-into-a-thick-porridge kind that you slurp down with a spoon—or a finger, if that’s all you’ve got. From our perspective, nearly half a millennium later, corn porridge doesn’t sound especially good. But apparently if you mix in some molasses, it isn’t that bad.

5. Pumpkin Pie

Pilgrims liked pumpkins. According to accounts, they used to hollow them out, fill them with milk and honey to make a custard, and then roast the orange orbs in hot ashes. But when it came to making pies, the Pilgrims were essentially out of luck. You need butter and wheat flour to make a crust, and in 1621, the Pilgrims didn’t have much of either.  

6. Lobster

You probably don’t eat lobster for Thanksgiving—but the Pilgrims and Wampanoag might have. In fact, food historians speculate that much of the meal must have consisted of seafood. One of the colonists, a man named Edward Winslow, described the setting around his Plymouth home in this way: “Our bay is full of lobsters all the summer and affordeth variety of other fish; in September we can take a hogshead of eels in a night with a small labor, and can dig them out of their beds all the winter. We have mussels . . . at our doors. Oysters we have none near, but we can have them brought by the Indians when we will.”

So, to the question “What did the Pilgrims eat for Thanksgiving,” the answer is both surprising and expected. Turkey (probably), venison, seafood, and all of the vegetables that they had planted and harvested that year—onions, carrots, beans, spinach, lettuce, and other greens. Was it good? Most experts agree that it must have been delicious; otherwise, it wouldn’t have become one of the most famous traditions of all time.

What about You?

Are you surprised to learn that the Pilgrims and their Wampanoag neighbors ate seafood and venison for Thanksgiving? Don’t be. This is the Big Feast we’re talking about—and adding your own personal twist to the traditional meal is, well, part of the tradition!

What are your family’s favorite Thanksgiving dishes? Have you ever taken a picture or recorded the recipe and uploaded it to FamilySearch.org? If so, you’re doing family history, which, by definition, is an awesome thing to do.

Go to Memories to get started. 

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