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10 Thanksgiving Myths Dispelled

Misconception Junction Presents 10 Jhanksgiving Myths Dispelled Myth #1: The Pilgrims invited the Indians to the harvest festival In fact, from Bradford's passage in "Of Plymouth Plantation", which are the only two first-hand passages that directly describe the event, the wording seems to imply that the Indians simply stopped by at random times throughout the event. Nowhere does it say they were invited. It is likely that the noise. from the various shooting games and the festivities, is what brought them over to investigate what was going on. At which point. they were allowed to participate in the festivities and at one point contributed five deer. slow's letter in December of 1621 and William Myth #2: The Pilgrims Celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America The Pilgrims did not celebrate the first Thanksgiving in America. In fact, the particular Pilgrim event that is often cited as the first Thanksgiving wasn't even a Thanksgiving festival; it was a harvest festival. This is made clear by the fact that the Indians were allowed to participate and there were games and dancing throughout the event. None of this would have been allowed in a holiday set aside to give thanks to God. However. the Pilgrims had actual Thanksgiving holidays before this harvest festival. These days of giving thanks to God were very common and celebrated throughout the year in England and many parts of Europe whenever there was something significant for a group to be thankful for. So who actually celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America? Nobody knows for sure owing to how common these days of thanks were, particularly in the New World. Three popular examples that are often referenced as the actual firsts and that pre-date the Pilgrims harvest festival include: * September 8, 1565: This day of thanksgiving was celebrated by a group of Spaniards lead by Spanish explorer Pedro Menendez de Avile. in Saint Augustine, Florida. İnterestingly. Menendez de Avile even invited the Timucua tribe to dine with them on that Thanksgiving. * 1598: In San Elizario. Texas, Spanish explorer Juan de Onate, on the banks of the Rio Grande, along with those with him held a Thanksgiving festival after they successfully crossed over 350 miles of Mexican desert. * December 4th. 1619: Thirty-eight settlers landed on James River, on a ship called the Margaret, about 20 miles from Jamestown. Their charter required that the day of landing be set aside as a day of thanksgiving both on that first date and every year after. This tradition died out due to the "Indian Massacre of 1622" where many of the settlers were killed and most of the rest fled to Jamestown. Myth #3: The pilgrims celebrated Thanksgiving at the end of November The actual harvest festival is thought to have taken place sometime between mid-September to late October. This specific harvest festival was based on a traditional English harvest festival that typically occurred on September 29th and it is thought the Pilgrim's harvest festival was around this same time. Myth #4: The Pilgrims and Indians sat down to a Thanksgiving dinner In fact. given that many Pilgrims lacked utensils and dishes, at this point, and that around 90 Native Americans participated along with the 52 Pilgrims, they are thought to have simply set food on available flat surfaces and people would eat with their hands whenever they were hungry during the three day festival. The Indians came and went as they pleased over the course of those three days. Myth #5: The Indians were dressed in loin-cloths for this event, Anyone who has ever been in New England in late September or in October should Know this one isn't true. The Indians would have been far too cold dressed in loin-cloths. By this time, they would have already donned more suitable garb for the chilly weather. Myth #6: The Pilgrims Wore All Black & White Clothing and- Buckled Top Hats The myth that they dressed like this stems from the popular clothing style of the day in England in the late 17th century, which carried over to 18th & 19th century depictions. Artist depictions, at that time, then simply depicted Pilgrims having worn the same style clothing that had become the fashion in England. These depictions of the Pilgrims' clothing endured to this day. Historical records of Pilgrims' clothing, such as the passenger list of the Mayflower, wills, which included descriptions of clothing, and other such records, paint a very different picture than the late 17th century artists. For starters, the Pilgrims didn't wear buckled hats. They also didn't wear buckles on their shoes or waists. Buckles were expensive and not in fashion at the time. They simply wore the much cheaper leather laces to tie up their shoes and hold up their pants. They also didn't only wear black and white. Their common garb was very colorful, as was the fashion at the time. They only wore predominately black and gray clothing on Sundays. The rest of the time, they wore heavily dyed clothing in many different colors; basically all the colors that could be achieved with natural dyes. In one example, a Pilgrim by the name of Brewster left his clothing in his will to someone. This clothing was described as such: one blew clothe suit. green drawers, a vilolete clothe coat, black silk stockings, skyblew garters, red grograin suit, red waistcoat, tawny colored suit with silver buttons. Myth #7: The Pilgrims Ate Popcorn on Thanksgiving Yet another myth surrounding the Pilgrims and Thanksgiving is that they were taught by the Indians to make Popcorn and served it at the "first" Thanksgiving. In fact, while there is little evidence of what they actually ate at their first Thanksgiving. they certainly wouldn't have eaten popcorn. This is because all they had available, at the time, was flint corn. This type of corn doesn't pop when heated, rather just expands slightly. Thus., it wasn't very palatable in this form. so they tended to boil it. preparing it as hominy. The Pilgrims also didn't eat pumpkin ( pie, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes or many other such Thanksgiving staples. Most of these "traditional" Thanksgiving foods come to us thanks to Sarah Josepha Hale's editorials in the widely circulated Godey's Lady's Book in the mid-19th century. Myth #8: Eating Turkey makes people drowsy The reason Turkey is often said to cause drowsiness is that it contains tryptophan. Tryptophan is used by your body to create serotonin. Serotonin. among other things, acts as a calming agent in the brain and plays a key role in sleep. So, with turkey containing tryptophan, one would logically say it would make you sleepy after you eat it.except, this isn't actually the case. So. why not? Primarily because of how the body deals with tryptophan. Tryptophan needs to not only be taken on an empty stomach to have any instant effect. but also needs little to no other amino acids or protein present in order to make you drowsy after you eat something that contains it. Given that there is a lot of protein and other amino acids in turkey. even if you are a bit malnourished, you are not going to get drowsy from the tryptophan after you eat it. This is because, when there are a lot of amino acids around, this causes competition among the amino acids as far as crossing the blood-brain barrier. Tryptophan is a particularly bulky amino acid so it ends up being at the back of the line, so to speak, and will generally stay there until those other amino acids are gone or, at the least until quite a lot of them are gone so the ratio of tryptophan to those other amino acids is drastically increased. So eating a large Thanksgiving dinner is going to guarantee that the tryptophan in the Turkey isn't going to have a shot at crossing the blood-brain barrier and ultimately making you drowsy. So why do you get drowsy after, say, eating turkey on Thanksgiving? Well, there are a lot of reasons, but primarily because, with your holiday meal. you likely just crammed a couple days worth of food into your body in the span of an hour or so, possibly with some alcohol, which is a central nervous system depressant that has a mild sedative effect. Also, with a full stomach. your body directs blood away from your central nervous system and other organ systems to help with your digestive system. More than anything, this is probably causing most of the drowsiness after a large turkey dinner. such as on Thanksgiving or Christmas or the like. Myth #9: Turkeys get their name from settlers noticing they sometimes make a "Turk Turk Turk" sound How they actually got their name was that, in the 16th century, when North American turkeys were first introduced in-mass to Europe. there was another bird that was popularly imported throughout Europe and England. called a guinea fowl. This guinea fowl was imported from Madagascar via the Ottoman Empire. The merchants who did this were known as "turkey merchants". The guinea fowl themselves eventually were popularly referred to as "turkey fowl", similar to how other product imported through the Ottoman Empire acquired their names, such as "turkey corn". "turkey wheat", etc. The North American turkey was thought by many to be a species of the type of guinea fowl that was imported via the Ottoman Empire and thus. began also being called a "turkey fowl" in English, with this eventually being shortened to just "turkey". Bonus Turkey Fact: Due to the white meat being the most popular part of a turkey. turkeys have been bred to have huge breasts. So much so, that modern day domesticated turkeys are no longer typically able to mate, due to the breasts getting in the way of the male mounting the female. As such. most hatcheries use artificial insemination to fertilize the eggs of the domestic turkey. Myth #10: President Roosevelt set the official date of Thanksgiving as the fourth Thursday in November, instead of the last, as it had been before. While Roosevelt technically did do this in 1939, what he was actually trying to do was to set a precedent that Thanksgiving should always be the 2nd to last Thursday in November, in order to lengthen the Christmas shopping season. November of 1939 happened to have five Thursdays. The following year had only four and Roosevelt thus named the third Thursday in November as Thanksgiving. He did this again in 1941 before Congress finally had to intervene due to the fact that only half the states were following Roosevelt's "Franksgiving", the other half. exceptTexas, went with the more traditional final Thursday in November. Texas chose to celebrate both days as Thanksgiving. It was Congress who set the date as the fourth Thursday in November. to go into effect in 1942. This was a compromise between the two factions, as sometimes it would be the last Thursday in November and sometimes the second to last. Designed by Noreen BuzzFactory.net) © MisconceptionJunction.com Misconception Junction Presents 10 Jhanksgiving Myths Dispelled Myth #1: The Pilgrims invited the Indians to the harvest festival In fact, from Bradford's passage in "Of Plymouth Plantation", which are the only two first-hand passages that directly describe the event, the wording seems to imply that the Indians simply stopped by at random times throughout the event. Nowhere does it say they were invited. It is likely that the noise. from the various shooting games and the festivities, is what brought them over to investigate what was going on. At which point. they were allowed to participate in the festivities and at one point contributed five deer. slow's letter in December of 1621 and William Myth #2: The Pilgrims Celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America The Pilgrims did not celebrate the first Thanksgiving in America. In fact, the particular Pilgrim event that is often cited as the first Thanksgiving wasn't even a Thanksgiving festival; it was a harvest festival. This is made clear by the fact that the Indians were allowed to participate and there were games and dancing throughout the event. None of this would have been allowed in a holiday set aside to give thanks to God. However. the Pilgrims had actual Thanksgiving holidays before this harvest festival. These days of giving thanks to God were very common and celebrated throughout the year in England and many parts of Europe whenever there was something significant for a group to be thankful for. So who actually celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America? Nobody knows for sure owing to how common these days of thanks were, particularly in the New World. Three popular examples that are often referenced as the actual firsts and that pre-date the Pilgrims harvest festival include: * September 8, 1565: This day of thanksgiving was celebrated by a group of Spaniards lead by Spanish explorer Pedro Menendez de Avile. in Saint Augustine, Florida. İnterestingly. Menendez de Avile even invited the Timucua tribe to dine with them on that Thanksgiving. * 1598: In San Elizario. Texas, Spanish explorer Juan de Onate, on the banks of the Rio Grande, along with those with him held a Thanksgiving festival after they successfully crossed over 350 miles of Mexican desert. * December 4th. 1619: Thirty-eight settlers landed on James River, on a ship called the Margaret, about 20 miles from Jamestown. Their charter required that the day of landing be set aside as a day of thanksgiving both on that first date and every year after. This tradition died out due to the "Indian Massacre of 1622" where many of the settlers were killed and most of the rest fled to Jamestown. Myth #3: The pilgrims celebrated Thanksgiving at the end of November The actual harvest festival is thought to have taken place sometime between mid-September to late October. This specific harvest festival was based on a traditional English harvest festival that typically occurred on September 29th and it is thought the Pilgrim's harvest festival was around this same time. Myth #4: The Pilgrims and Indians sat down to a Thanksgiving dinner In fact. given that many Pilgrims lacked utensils and dishes, at this point, and that around 90 Native Americans participated along with the 52 Pilgrims, they are thought to have simply set food on available flat surfaces and people would eat with their hands whenever they were hungry during the three day festival. The Indians came and went as they pleased over the course of those three days. Myth #5: The Indians were dressed in loin-cloths for this event, Anyone who has ever been in New England in late September or in October should Know this one isn't true. The Indians would have been far too cold dressed in loin-cloths. By this time, they would have already donned more suitable garb for the chilly weather. Myth #6: The Pilgrims Wore All Black & White Clothing and- Buckled Top Hats The myth that they dressed like this stems from the popular clothing style of the day in England in the late 17th century, which carried over to 18th & 19th century depictions. Artist depictions, at that time, then simply depicted Pilgrims having worn the same style clothing that had become the fashion in England. These depictions of the Pilgrims' clothing endured to this day. Historical records of Pilgrims' clothing, such as the passenger list of the Mayflower, wills, which included descriptions of clothing, and other such records, paint a very different picture than the late 17th century artists. For starters, the Pilgrims didn't wear buckled hats. They also didn't wear buckles on their shoes or waists. Buckles were expensive and not in fashion at the time. They simply wore the much cheaper leather laces to tie up their shoes and hold up their pants. They also didn't only wear black and white. Their common garb was very colorful, as was the fashion at the time. They only wore predominately black and gray clothing on Sundays. The rest of the time, they wore heavily dyed clothing in many different colors; basically all the colors that could be achieved with natural dyes. In one example, a Pilgrim by the name of Brewster left his clothing in his will to someone. This clothing was described as such: one blew clothe suit. green drawers, a vilolete clothe coat, black silk stockings, skyblew garters, red grograin suit, red waistcoat, tawny colored suit with silver buttons. Myth #7: The Pilgrims Ate Popcorn on Thanksgiving Yet another myth surrounding the Pilgrims and Thanksgiving is that they were taught by the Indians to make Popcorn and served it at the "first" Thanksgiving. In fact, while there is little evidence of what they actually ate at their first Thanksgiving. they certainly wouldn't have eaten popcorn. This is because all they had available, at the time, was flint corn. This type of corn doesn't pop when heated, rather just expands slightly. Thus., it wasn't very palatable in this form. so they tended to boil it. preparing it as hominy. The Pilgrims also didn't eat pumpkin ( pie, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes or many other such Thanksgiving staples. Most of these "traditional" Thanksgiving foods come to us thanks to Sarah Josepha Hale's editorials in the widely circulated Godey's Lady's Book in the mid-19th century. Myth #8: Eating Turkey makes people drowsy The reason Turkey is often said to cause drowsiness is that it contains tryptophan. Tryptophan is used by your body to create serotonin. Serotonin. among other things, acts as a calming agent in the brain and plays a key role in sleep. So, with turkey containing tryptophan, one would logically say it would make you sleepy after you eat it.except, this isn't actually the case. So. why not? Primarily because of how the body deals with tryptophan. Tryptophan needs to not only be taken on an empty stomach to have any instant effect. but also needs little to no other amino acids or protein present in order to make you drowsy after you eat something that contains it. Given that there is a lot of protein and other amino acids in turkey. even if you are a bit malnourished, you are not going to get drowsy from the tryptophan after you eat it. This is because, when there are a lot of amino acids around, this causes competition among the amino acids as far as crossing the blood-brain barrier. Tryptophan is a particularly bulky amino acid so it ends up being at the back of the line, so to speak, and will generally stay there until those other amino acids are gone or, at the least until quite a lot of them are gone so the ratio of tryptophan to those other amino acids is drastically increased. So eating a large Thanksgiving dinner is going to guarantee that the tryptophan in the Turkey isn't going to have a shot at crossing the blood-brain barrier and ultimately making you drowsy. So why do you get drowsy after, say, eating turkey on Thanksgiving? Well, there are a lot of reasons, but primarily because, with your holiday meal. you likely just crammed a couple days worth of food into your body in the span of an hour or so, possibly with some alcohol, which is a central nervous system depressant that has a mild sedative effect. Also, with a full stomach. your body directs blood away from your central nervous system and other organ systems to help with your digestive system. More than anything, this is probably causing most of the drowsiness after a large turkey dinner. such as on Thanksgiving or Christmas or the like. Myth #9: Turkeys get their name from settlers noticing they sometimes make a "Turk Turk Turk" sound How they actually got their name was that, in the 16th century, when North American turkeys were first introduced in-mass to Europe. there was another bird that was popularly imported throughout Europe and England. called a guinea fowl. This guinea fowl was imported from Madagascar via the Ottoman Empire. The merchants who did this were known as "turkey merchants". The guinea fowl themselves eventually were popularly referred to as "turkey fowl", similar to how other product imported through the Ottoman Empire acquired their names, such as "turkey corn". "turkey wheat", etc. The North American turkey was thought by many to be a species of the type of guinea fowl that was imported via the Ottoman Empire and thus. began also being called a "turkey fowl" in English, with this eventually being shortened to just "turkey". Bonus Turkey Fact: Due to the white meat being the most popular part of a turkey. turkeys have been bred to have huge breasts. So much so, that modern day domesticated turkeys are no longer typically able to mate, due to the breasts getting in the way of the male mounting the female. As such. most hatcheries use artificial insemination to fertilize the eggs of the domestic turkey. Myth #10: President Roosevelt set the official date of Thanksgiving as the fourth Thursday in November, instead of the last, as it had been before. While Roosevelt technically did do this in 1939, what he was actually trying to do was to set a precedent that Thanksgiving should always be the 2nd to last Thursday in November, in order to lengthen the Christmas shopping season. November of 1939 happened to have five Thursdays. The following year had only four and Roosevelt thus named the third Thursday in November as Thanksgiving. He did this again in 1941 before Congress finally had to intervene due to the fact that only half the states were following Roosevelt's "Franksgiving", the other half. exceptTexas, went with the more traditional final Thursday in November. Texas chose to celebrate both days as Thanksgiving. It was Congress who set the date as the fourth Thursday in November. to go into effect in 1942. This was a compromise between the two factions, as sometimes it would be the last Thursday in November and sometimes the second to last. Designed by Noreen BuzzFactory.net) © MisconceptionJunction.com Misconception Junction Presents 10 Jhanksgiving Myths Dispelled Myth #1: The Pilgrims invited the Indians to the harvest festival In fact, from Bradford's passage in "Of Plymouth Plantation", which are the only two first-hand passages that directly describe the event, the wording seems to imply that the Indians simply stopped by at random times throughout the event. Nowhere does it say they were invited. It is likely that the noise. from the various shooting games and the festivities, is what brought them over to investigate what was going on. At which point. they were allowed to participate in the festivities and at one point contributed five deer. slow's letter in December of 1621 and William Myth #2: The Pilgrims Celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America The Pilgrims did not celebrate the first Thanksgiving in America. In fact, the particular Pilgrim event that is often cited as the first Thanksgiving wasn't even a Thanksgiving festival; it was a harvest festival. This is made clear by the fact that the Indians were allowed to participate and there were games and dancing throughout the event. None of this would have been allowed in a holiday set aside to give thanks to God. However. the Pilgrims had actual Thanksgiving holidays before this harvest festival. These days of giving thanks to God were very common and celebrated throughout the year in England and many parts of Europe whenever there was something significant for a group to be thankful for. So who actually celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America? Nobody knows for sure owing to how common these days of thanks were, particularly in the New World. Three popular examples that are often referenced as the actual firsts and that pre-date the Pilgrims harvest festival include: * September 8, 1565: This day of thanksgiving was celebrated by a group of Spaniards lead by Spanish explorer Pedro Menendez de Avile. in Saint Augustine, Florida. İnterestingly. Menendez de Avile even invited the Timucua tribe to dine with them on that Thanksgiving. * 1598: In San Elizario. Texas, Spanish explorer Juan de Onate, on the banks of the Rio Grande, along with those with him held a Thanksgiving festival after they successfully crossed over 350 miles of Mexican desert. * December 4th. 1619: Thirty-eight settlers landed on James River, on a ship called the Margaret, about 20 miles from Jamestown. Their charter required that the day of landing be set aside as a day of thanksgiving both on that first date and every year after. This tradition died out due to the "Indian Massacre of 1622" where many of the settlers were killed and most of the rest fled to Jamestown. Myth #3: The pilgrims celebrated Thanksgiving at the end of November The actual harvest festival is thought to have taken place sometime between mid-September to late October. This specific harvest festival was based on a traditional English harvest festival that typically occurred on September 29th and it is thought the Pilgrim's harvest festival was around this same time. Myth #4: The Pilgrims and Indians sat down to a Thanksgiving dinner In fact. given that many Pilgrims lacked utensils and dishes, at this point, and that around 90 Native Americans participated along with the 52 Pilgrims, they are thought to have simply set food on available flat surfaces and people would eat with their hands whenever they were hungry during the three day festival. The Indians came and went as they pleased over the course of those three days. Myth #5: The Indians were dressed in loin-cloths for this event, Anyone who has ever been in New England in late September or in October should Know this one isn't true. The Indians would have been far too cold dressed in loin-cloths. By this time, they would have already donned more suitable garb for the chilly weather. Myth #6: The Pilgrims Wore All Black & White Clothing and- Buckled Top Hats The myth that they dressed like this stems from the popular clothing style of the day in England in the late 17th century, which carried over to 18th & 19th century depictions. Artist depictions, at that time, then simply depicted Pilgrims having worn the same style clothing that had become the fashion in England. These depictions of the Pilgrims' clothing endured to this day. Historical records of Pilgrims' clothing, such as the passenger list of the Mayflower, wills, which included descriptions of clothing, and other such records, paint a very different picture than the late 17th century artists. For starters, the Pilgrims didn't wear buckled hats. They also didn't wear buckles on their shoes or waists. Buckles were expensive and not in fashion at the time. They simply wore the much cheaper leather laces to tie up their shoes and hold up their pants. They also didn't only wear black and white. Their common garb was very colorful, as was the fashion at the time. They only wore predominately black and gray clothing on Sundays. The rest of the time, they wore heavily dyed clothing in many different colors; basically all the colors that could be achieved with natural dyes. In one example, a Pilgrim by the name of Brewster left his clothing in his will to someone. This clothing was described as such: one blew clothe suit. green drawers, a vilolete clothe coat, black silk stockings, skyblew garters, red grograin suit, red waistcoat, tawny colored suit with silver buttons. Myth #7: The Pilgrims Ate Popcorn on Thanksgiving Yet another myth surrounding the Pilgrims and Thanksgiving is that they were taught by the Indians to make Popcorn and served it at the "first" Thanksgiving. In fact, while there is little evidence of what they actually ate at their first Thanksgiving. they certainly wouldn't have eaten popcorn. This is because all they had available, at the time, was flint corn. This type of corn doesn't pop when heated, rather just expands slightly. Thus., it wasn't very palatable in this form. so they tended to boil it. preparing it as hominy. The Pilgrims also didn't eat pumpkin ( pie, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes or many other such Thanksgiving staples. Most of these "traditional" Thanksgiving foods come to us thanks to Sarah Josepha Hale's editorials in the widely circulated Godey's Lady's Book in the mid-19th century. Myth #8: Eating Turkey makes people drowsy The reason Turkey is often said to cause drowsiness is that it contains tryptophan. Tryptophan is used by your body to create serotonin. Serotonin. among other things, acts as a calming agent in the brain and plays a key role in sleep. So, with turkey containing tryptophan, one would logically say it would make you sleepy after you eat it.except, this isn't actually the case. So. why not? Primarily because of how the body deals with tryptophan. Tryptophan needs to not only be taken on an empty stomach to have any instant effect. but also needs little to no other amino acids or protein present in order to make you drowsy after you eat something that contains it. Given that there is a lot of protein and other amino acids in turkey. even if you are a bit malnourished, you are not going to get drowsy from the tryptophan after you eat it. This is because, when there are a lot of amino acids around, this causes competition among the amino acids as far as crossing the blood-brain barrier. Tryptophan is a particularly bulky amino acid so it ends up being at the back of the line, so to speak, and will generally stay there until those other amino acids are gone or, at the least until quite a lot of them are gone so the ratio of tryptophan to those other amino acids is drastically increased. So eating a large Thanksgiving dinner is going to guarantee that the tryptophan in the Turkey isn't going to have a shot at crossing the blood-brain barrier and ultimately making you drowsy. So why do you get drowsy after, say, eating turkey on Thanksgiving? Well, there are a lot of reasons, but primarily because, with your holiday meal. you likely just crammed a couple days worth of food into your body in the span of an hour or so, possibly with some alcohol, which is a central nervous system depressant that has a mild sedative effect. Also, with a full stomach. your body directs blood away from your central nervous system and other organ systems to help with your digestive system. More than anything, this is probably causing most of the drowsiness after a large turkey dinner. such as on Thanksgiving or Christmas or the like. Myth #9: Turkeys get their name from settlers noticing they sometimes make a "Turk Turk Turk" sound How they actually got their name was that, in the 16th century, when North American turkeys were first introduced in-mass to Europe. there was another bird that was popularly imported throughout Europe and England. called a guinea fowl. This guinea fowl was imported from Madagascar via the Ottoman Empire. The merchants who did this were known as "turkey merchants". The guinea fowl themselves eventually were popularly referred to as "turkey fowl", similar to how other product imported through the Ottoman Empire acquired their names, such as "turkey corn". "turkey wheat", etc. The North American turkey was thought by many to be a species of the type of guinea fowl that was imported via the Ottoman Empire and thus. began also being called a "turkey fowl" in English, with this eventually being shortened to just "turkey". Bonus Turkey Fact: Due to the white meat being the most popular part of a turkey. turkeys have been bred to have huge breasts. So much so, that modern day domesticated turkeys are no longer typically able to mate, due to the breasts getting in the way of the male mounting the female. As such. most hatcheries use artificial insemination to fertilize the eggs of the domestic turkey. Myth #10: President Roosevelt set the official date of Thanksgiving as the fourth Thursday in November, instead of the last, as it had been before. While Roosevelt technically did do this in 1939, what he was actually trying to do was to set a precedent that Thanksgiving should always be the 2nd to last Thursday in November, in order to lengthen the Christmas shopping season. November of 1939 happened to have five Thursdays. The following year had only four and Roosevelt thus named the third Thursday in November as Thanksgiving. He did this again in 1941 before Congress finally had to intervene due to the fact that only half the states were following Roosevelt's "Franksgiving", the other half. exceptTexas, went with the more traditional final Thursday in November. Texas chose to celebrate both days as Thanksgiving. It was Congress who set the date as the fourth Thursday in November. to go into effect in 1942. This was a compromise between the two factions, as sometimes it would be the last Thursday in November and sometimes the second to last. Designed by Noreen BuzzFactory.net) © MisconceptionJunction.com Misconception Junction Presents 10 Jhanksgiving Myths Dispelled Myth #1: The Pilgrims invited the Indians to the harvest festival In fact, from Bradford's passage in "Of Plymouth Plantation", which are the only two first-hand passages that directly describe the event, the wording seems to imply that the Indians simply stopped by at random times throughout the event. Nowhere does it say they were invited. It is likely that the noise. from the various shooting games and the festivities, is what brought them over to investigate what was going on. At which point. they were allowed to participate in the festivities and at one point contributed five deer. slow's letter in December of 1621 and William Myth #2: The Pilgrims Celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America The Pilgrims did not celebrate the first Thanksgiving in America. In fact, the particular Pilgrim event that is often cited as the first Thanksgiving wasn't even a Thanksgiving festival; it was a harvest festival. This is made clear by the fact that the Indians were allowed to participate and there were games and dancing throughout the event. None of this would have been allowed in a holiday set aside to give thanks to God. However. the Pilgrims had actual Thanksgiving holidays before this harvest festival. These days of giving thanks to God were very common and celebrated throughout the year in England and many parts of Europe whenever there was something significant for a group to be thankful for. So who actually celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America? Nobody knows for sure owing to how common these days of thanks were, particularly in the New World. Three popular examples that are often referenced as the actual firsts and that pre-date the Pilgrims harvest festival include: * September 8, 1565: This day of thanksgiving was celebrated by a group of Spaniards lead by Spanish explorer Pedro Menendez de Avile. in Saint Augustine, Florida. İnterestingly. Menendez de Avile even invited the Timucua tribe to dine with them on that Thanksgiving. * 1598: In San Elizario. Texas, Spanish explorer Juan de Onate, on the banks of the Rio Grande, along with those with him held a Thanksgiving festival after they successfully crossed over 350 miles of Mexican desert. * December 4th. 1619: Thirty-eight settlers landed on James River, on a ship called the Margaret, about 20 miles from Jamestown. Their charter required that the day of landing be set aside as a day of thanksgiving both on that first date and every year after. This tradition died out due to the "Indian Massacre of 1622" where many of the settlers were killed and most of the rest fled to Jamestown. Myth #3: The pilgrims celebrated Thanksgiving at the end of November The actual harvest festival is thought to have taken place sometime between mid-September to late October. This specific harvest festival was based on a traditional English harvest festival that typically occurred on September 29th and it is thought the Pilgrim's harvest festival was around this same time. Myth #4: The Pilgrims and Indians sat down to a Thanksgiving dinner In fact. given that many Pilgrims lacked utensils and dishes, at this point, and that around 90 Native Americans participated along with the 52 Pilgrims, they are thought to have simply set food on available flat surfaces and people would eat with their hands whenever they were hungry during the three day festival. The Indians came and went as they pleased over the course of those three days. Myth #5: The Indians were dressed in loin-cloths for this event, Anyone who has ever been in New England in late September or in October should Know this one isn't true. The Indians would have been far too cold dressed in loin-cloths. By this time, they would have already donned more suitable garb for the chilly weather. Myth #6: The Pilgrims Wore All Black & White Clothing and- Buckled Top Hats The myth that they dressed like this stems from the popular clothing style of the day in England in the late 17th century, which carried over to 18th & 19th century depictions. Artist depictions, at that time, then simply depicted Pilgrims having worn the same style clothing that had become the fashion in England. These depictions of the Pilgrims' clothing endured to this day. Historical records of Pilgrims' clothing, such as the passenger list of the Mayflower, wills, which included descriptions of clothing, and other such records, paint a very different picture than the late 17th century artists. For starters, the Pilgrims didn't wear buckled hats. They also didn't wear buckles on their shoes or waists. Buckles were expensive and not in fashion at the time. They simply wore the much cheaper leather laces to tie up their shoes and hold up their pants. They also didn't only wear black and white. Their common garb was very colorful, as was the fashion at the time. They only wore predominately black and gray clothing on Sundays. The rest of the time, they wore heavily dyed clothing in many different colors; basically all the colors that could be achieved with natural dyes. In one example, a Pilgrim by the name of Brewster left his clothing in his will to someone. This clothing was described as such: one blew clothe suit. green drawers, a vilolete clothe coat, black silk stockings, skyblew garters, red grograin suit, red waistcoat, tawny colored suit with silver buttons. Myth #7: The Pilgrims Ate Popcorn on Thanksgiving Yet another myth surrounding the Pilgrims and Thanksgiving is that they were taught by the Indians to make Popcorn and served it at the "first" Thanksgiving. In fact, while there is little evidence of what they actually ate at their first Thanksgiving. they certainly wouldn't have eaten popcorn. This is because all they had available, at the time, was flint corn. This type of corn doesn't pop when heated, rather just expands slightly. Thus., it wasn't very palatable in this form. so they tended to boil it. preparing it as hominy. The Pilgrims also didn't eat pumpkin ( pie, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes or many other such Thanksgiving staples. Most of these "traditional" Thanksgiving foods come to us thanks to Sarah Josepha Hale's editorials in the widely circulated Godey's Lady's Book in the mid-19th century. Myth #8: Eating Turkey makes people drowsy The reason Turkey is often said to cause drowsiness is that it contains tryptophan. Tryptophan is used by your body to create serotonin. Serotonin. among other things, acts as a calming agent in the brain and plays a key role in sleep. So, with turkey containing tryptophan, one would logically say it would make you sleepy after you eat it.except, this isn't actually the case. So. why not? Primarily because of how the body deals with tryptophan. Tryptophan needs to not only be taken on an empty stomach to have any instant effect. but also needs little to no other amino acids or protein present in order to make you drowsy after you eat something that contains it. Given that there is a lot of protein and other amino acids in turkey. even if you are a bit malnourished, you are not going to get drowsy from the tryptophan after you eat it. This is because, when there are a lot of amino acids around, this causes competition among the amino acids as far as crossing the blood-brain barrier. Tryptophan is a particularly bulky amino acid so it ends up being at the back of the line, so to speak, and will generally stay there until those other amino acids are gone or, at the least until quite a lot of them are gone so the ratio of tryptophan to those other amino acids is drastically increased. So eating a large Thanksgiving dinner is going to guarantee that the tryptophan in the Turkey isn't going to have a shot at crossing the blood-brain barrier and ultimately making you drowsy. So why do you get drowsy after, say, eating turkey on Thanksgiving? Well, there are a lot of reasons, but primarily because, with your holiday meal. you likely just crammed a couple days worth of food into your body in the span of an hour or so, possibly with some alcohol, which is a central nervous system depressant that has a mild sedative effect. Also, with a full stomach. your body directs blood away from your central nervous system and other organ systems to help with your digestive system. More than anything, this is probably causing most of the drowsiness after a large turkey dinner. such as on Thanksgiving or Christmas or the like. Myth #9: Turkeys get their name from settlers noticing they sometimes make a "Turk Turk Turk" sound How they actually got their name was that, in the 16th century, when North American turkeys were first introduced in-mass to Europe. there was another bird that was popularly imported throughout Europe and England. called a guinea fowl. This guinea fowl was imported from Madagascar via the Ottoman Empire. The merchants who did this were known as "turkey merchants". The guinea fowl themselves eventually were popularly referred to as "turkey fowl", similar to how other product imported through the Ottoman Empire acquired their names, such as "turkey corn". "turkey wheat", etc. The North American turkey was thought by many to be a species of the type of guinea fowl that was imported via the Ottoman Empire and thus. began also being called a "turkey fowl" in English, with this eventually being shortened to just "turkey". Bonus Turkey Fact: Due to the white meat being the most popular part of a turkey. turkeys have been bred to have huge breasts. So much so, that modern day domesticated turkeys are no longer typically able to mate, due to the breasts getting in the way of the male mounting the female. As such. most hatcheries use artificial insemination to fertilize the eggs of the domestic turkey. Myth #10: President Roosevelt set the official date of Thanksgiving as the fourth Thursday in November, instead of the last, as it had been before. While Roosevelt technically did do this in 1939, what he was actually trying to do was to set a precedent that Thanksgiving should always be the 2nd to last Thursday in November, in order to lengthen the Christmas shopping season. November of 1939 happened to have five Thursdays. The following year had only four and Roosevelt thus named the third Thursday in November as Thanksgiving. He did this again in 1941 before Congress finally had to intervene due to the fact that only half the states were following Roosevelt's "Franksgiving", the other half. exceptTexas, went with the more traditional final Thursday in November. Texas chose to celebrate both days as Thanksgiving. It was Congress who set the date as the fourth Thursday in November. to go into effect in 1942. This was a compromise between the two factions, as sometimes it would be the last Thursday in November and sometimes the second to last. Designed by Noreen BuzzFactory.net) © MisconceptionJunction.com Misconception Junction Presents 10 Jhanksgiving Myths Dispelled Myth #1: The Pilgrims invited the Indians to the harvest festival In fact, from Bradford's passage in "Of Plymouth Plantation", which are the only two first-hand passages that directly describe the event, the wording seems to imply that the Indians simply stopped by at random times throughout the event. Nowhere does it say they were invited. It is likely that the noise. from the various shooting games and the festivities, is what brought them over to investigate what was going on. At which point. they were allowed to participate in the festivities and at one point contributed five deer. slow's letter in December of 1621 and William Myth #2: The Pilgrims Celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America The Pilgrims did not celebrate the first Thanksgiving in America. In fact, the particular Pilgrim event that is often cited as the first Thanksgiving wasn't even a Thanksgiving festival; it was a harvest festival. This is made clear by the fact that the Indians were allowed to participate and there were games and dancing throughout the event. None of this would have been allowed in a holiday set aside to give thanks to God. However. the Pilgrims had actual Thanksgiving holidays before this harvest festival. These days of giving thanks to God were very common and celebrated throughout the year in England and many parts of Europe whenever there was something significant for a group to be thankful for. So who actually celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America? Nobody knows for sure owing to how common these days of thanks were, particularly in the New World. Three popular examples that are often referenced as the actual firsts and that pre-date the Pilgrims harvest festival include: * September 8, 1565: This day of thanksgiving was celebrated by a group of Spaniards lead by Spanish explorer Pedro Menendez de Avile. in Saint Augustine, Florida. İnterestingly. Menendez de Avile even invited the Timucua tribe to dine with them on that Thanksgiving. * 1598: In San Elizario. Texas, Spanish explorer Juan de Onate, on the banks of the Rio Grande, along with those with him held a Thanksgiving festival after they successfully crossed over 350 miles of Mexican desert. * December 4th. 1619: Thirty-eight settlers landed on James River, on a ship called the Margaret, about 20 miles from Jamestown. Their charter required that the day of landing be set aside as a day of thanksgiving both on that first date and every year after. This tradition died out due to the "Indian Massacre of 1622" where many of the settlers were killed and most of the rest fled to Jamestown. Myth #3: The pilgrims celebrated Thanksgiving at the end of November The actual harvest festival is thought to have taken place sometime between mid-September to late October. This specific harvest festival was based on a traditional English harvest festival that typically occurred on September 29th and it is thought the Pilgrim's harvest festival was around this same time. Myth #4: The Pilgrims and Indians sat down to a Thanksgiving dinner In fact. given that many Pilgrims lacked utensils and dishes, at this point, and that around 90 Native Americans participated along with the 52 Pilgrims, they are thought to have simply set food on available flat surfaces and people would eat with their hands whenever they were hungry during the three day festival. The Indians came and went as they pleased over the course of those three days. Myth #5: The Indians were dressed in loin-cloths for this event, Anyone who has ever been in New England in late September or in October should Know this one isn't true. The Indians would have been far too cold dressed in loin-cloths. By this time, they would have already donned more suitable garb for the chilly weather. Myth #6: The Pilgrims Wore All Black & White Clothing and- Buckled Top Hats The myth that they dressed like this stems from the popular clothing style of the day in England in the late 17th century, which carried over to 18th & 19th century depictions. Artist depictions, at that time, then simply depicted Pilgrims having worn the same style clothing that had become the fashion in England. These depictions of the Pilgrims' clothing endured to this day. Historical records of Pilgrims' clothing, such as the passenger list of the Mayflower, wills, which included descriptions of clothing, and other such records, paint a very different picture than the late 17th century artists. For starters, the Pilgrims didn't wear buckled hats. They also didn't wear buckles on their shoes or waists. Buckles were expensive and not in fashion at the time. They simply wore the much cheaper leather laces to tie up their shoes and hold up their pants. They also didn't only wear black and white. Their common garb was very colorful, as was the fashion at the time. They only wore predominately black and gray clothing on Sundays. The rest of the time, they wore heavily dyed clothing in many different colors; basically all the colors that could be achieved with natural dyes. In one example, a Pilgrim by the name of Brewster left his clothing in his will to someone. This clothing was described as such: one blew clothe suit. green drawers, a vilolete clothe coat, black silk stockings, skyblew garters, red grograin suit, red waistcoat, tawny colored suit with silver buttons. Myth #7: The Pilgrims Ate Popcorn on Thanksgiving Yet another myth surrounding the Pilgrims and Thanksgiving is that they were taught by the Indians to make Popcorn and served it at the "first" Thanksgiving. In fact, while there is little evidence of what they actually ate at their first Thanksgiving. they certainly wouldn't have eaten popcorn. This is because all they had available, at the time, was flint corn. This type of corn doesn't pop when heated, rather just expands slightly. Thus., it wasn't very palatable in this form. so they tended to boil it. preparing it as hominy. The Pilgrims also didn't eat pumpkin ( pie, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes or many other such Thanksgiving staples. Most of these "traditional" Thanksgiving foods come to us thanks to Sarah Josepha Hale's editorials in the widely circulated Godey's Lady's Book in the mid-19th century. Myth #8: Eating Turkey makes people drowsy The reason Turkey is often said to cause drowsiness is that it contains tryptophan. Tryptophan is used by your body to create serotonin. Serotonin. among other things, acts as a calming agent in the brain and plays a key role in sleep. So, with turkey containing tryptophan, one would logically say it would make you sleepy after you eat it.except, this isn't actually the case. So. why not? Primarily because of how the body deals with tryptophan. Tryptophan needs to not only be taken on an empty stomach to have any instant effect. but also needs little to no other amino acids or protein present in order to make you drowsy after you eat something that contains it. Given that there is a lot of protein and other amino acids in turkey. even if you are a bit malnourished, you are not going to get drowsy from the tryptophan after you eat it. This is because, when there are a lot of amino acids around, this causes competition among the amino acids as far as crossing the blood-brain barrier. Tryptophan is a particularly bulky amino acid so it ends up being at the back of the line, so to speak, and will generally stay there until those other amino acids are gone or, at the least until quite a lot of them are gone so the ratio of tryptophan to those other amino acids is drastically increased. So eating a large Thanksgiving dinner is going to guarantee that the tryptophan in the Turkey isn't going to have a shot at crossing the blood-brain barrier and ultimately making you drowsy. So why do you get drowsy after, say, eating turkey on Thanksgiving? Well, there are a lot of reasons, but primarily because, with your holiday meal. you likely just crammed a couple days worth of food into your body in the span of an hour or so, possibly with some alcohol, which is a central nervous system depressant that has a mild sedative effect. Also, with a full stomach. your body directs blood away from your central nervous system and other organ systems to help with your digestive system. More than anything, this is probably causing most of the drowsiness after a large turkey dinner. such as on Thanksgiving or Christmas or the like. Myth #9: Turkeys get their name from settlers noticing they sometimes make a "Turk Turk Turk" sound How they actually got their name was that, in the 16th century, when North American turkeys were first introduced in-mass to Europe. there was another bird that was popularly imported throughout Europe and England. called a guinea fowl. This guinea fowl was imported from Madagascar via the Ottoman Empire. The merchants who did this were known as "turkey merchants". The guinea fowl themselves eventually were popularly referred to as "turkey fowl", similar to how other product imported through the Ottoman Empire acquired their names, such as "turkey corn". "turkey wheat", etc. The North American turkey was thought by many to be a species of the type of guinea fowl that was imported via the Ottoman Empire and thus. began also being called a "turkey fowl" in English, with this eventually being shortened to just "turkey". Bonus Turkey Fact: Due to the white meat being the most popular part of a turkey. turkeys have been bred to have huge breasts. So much so, that modern day domesticated turkeys are no longer typically able to mate, due to the breasts getting in the way of the male mounting the female. As such. most hatcheries use artificial insemination to fertilize the eggs of the domestic turkey. Myth #10: President Roosevelt set the official date of Thanksgiving as the fourth Thursday in November, instead of the last, as it had been before. While Roosevelt technically did do this in 1939, what he was actually trying to do was to set a precedent that Thanksgiving should always be the 2nd to last Thursday in November, in order to lengthen the Christmas shopping season. November of 1939 happened to have five Thursdays. The following year had only four and Roosevelt thus named the third Thursday in November as Thanksgiving. He did this again in 1941 before Congress finally had to intervene due to the fact that only half the states were following Roosevelt's "Franksgiving", the other half. exceptTexas, went with the more traditional final Thursday in November. Texas chose to celebrate both days as Thanksgiving. It was Congress who set the date as the fourth Thursday in November. to go into effect in 1942. This was a compromise between the two factions, as sometimes it would be the last Thursday in November and sometimes the second to last. Designed by Noreen BuzzFactory.net) © MisconceptionJunction.com Misconception Junction Presents 10 Jhanksgiving Myths Dispelled Myth #1: The Pilgrims invited the Indians to the harvest festival In fact, from Bradford's passage in "Of Plymouth Plantation", which are the only two first-hand passages that directly describe the event, the wording seems to imply that the Indians simply stopped by at random times throughout the event. Nowhere does it say they were invited. It is likely that the noise. from the various shooting games and the festivities, is what brought them over to investigate what was going on. At which point. they were allowed to participate in the festivities and at one point contributed five deer. slow's letter in December of 1621 and William Myth #2: The Pilgrims Celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America The Pilgrims did not celebrate the first Thanksgiving in America. In fact, the particular Pilgrim event that is often cited as the first Thanksgiving wasn't even a Thanksgiving festival; it was a harvest festival. This is made clear by the fact that the Indians were allowed to participate and there were games and dancing throughout the event. None of this would have been allowed in a holiday set aside to give thanks to God. However. the Pilgrims had actual Thanksgiving holidays before this harvest festival. These days of giving thanks to God were very common and celebrated throughout the year in England and many parts of Europe whenever there was something significant for a group to be thankful for. So who actually celebrated the first Thanksgiving in America? Nobody knows for sure owing to how common these days of thanks were, particularly in the New World. Three popular examples that are often referenced as the actual firsts and that pre-date the Pilgrims harvest festival include: * September 8, 1565: This day of thanksgiving was celebrated by a group of Spaniards lead by Spanish explorer Pedro Menendez de Avile. in Saint Augustine, Florida. İnterestingly. Menendez de Avile even invited the Timucua tribe to dine with them on that Thanksgiving. * 1598: In San Elizario. Texas, Spanish explorer Juan de Onate, on the banks of the Rio Grande, along with those with him held a Thanksgiving festival after they successfully crossed over 350 miles of Mexican desert. * December 4th. 1619: Thirty-eight settlers landed on James River, on a ship called the Margaret, about 20 miles from Jamestown. Their charter required that the day of landing be set aside as a day of thanksgiving both on that first date and every year after. This tradition died out due to the "Indian Massacre of 1622" where many of the settlers were killed and most of the rest fled to Jamestown. Myth #3: The pilgrims celebrated Thanksgiving at the end of November The actual harvest festival is thought to have taken place sometime between mid-September to late October. This specific harvest festival was based on a traditional English harvest festival that typically occurred on September 29th and it is thought the Pilgrim's harvest festival was around this same time. Myth #4: The Pilgrims and Indians sat down to a Thanksgiving dinner In fact. given that many Pilgrims lacked utensils and dishes, at this point, and that around 90 Native Americans participated along with the 52 Pilgrims, they are thought to have simply set food on available flat surfaces and people would eat with their hands whenever they were hungry during the three day festival. The Indians came and went as they pleased over the course of those three days. Myth #5: The Indians were dressed in loin-cloths for this event, Anyone who has ever been in New England in late September or in October should Know this one isn't true. The Indians would have been far too cold dressed in loin-cloths. By this time, they would have already donned more suitable garb for the chilly weather. Myth #6: The Pilgrims Wore All Black & White Clothing and- Buckled Top Hats The myth that they dressed like this stems from the popular clothing style of the day in England in the late 17th century, which carried over to 18th & 19th century depictions. Artist depictions, at that time, then simply depicted Pilgrims having worn the same style clothing that had become the fashion in England. These depictions of the Pilgrims' clothing endured to this day. Historical records of Pilgrims' clothing, such as the passenger list of the Mayflower, wills, which included descriptions of clothing, and other such records, paint a very different picture than the late 17th century artists. For starters, the Pilgrims didn't wear buckled hats. They also didn't wear buckles on their shoes or waists. Buckles were expensive and not in fashion at the time. They simply wore the much cheaper leather laces to tie up their shoes and hold up their pants. They also didn't only wear black and white. Their common garb was very colorful, as was the fashion at the time. They only wore predominately black and gray clothing on Sundays. The rest of the time, they wore heavily dyed clothing in many different colors; basically all the colors that could be achieved with natural dyes. In one example, a Pilgrim by the name of Brewster left his clothing in his will to someone. This clothing was described as such: one blew clothe suit. green drawers, a vilolete clothe coat, black silk stockings, skyblew garters, red grograin suit, red waistcoat, tawny colored suit with silver buttons. Myth #7: The Pilgrims Ate Popcorn on Thanksgiving Yet another myth surrounding the Pilgrims and Thanksgiving is that they were taught by the Indians to make Popcorn and served it at the "first" Thanksgiving. In fact, while there is little evidence of what they actually ate at their first Thanksgiving. they certainly wouldn't have eaten popcorn. This is because all they had available, at the time, was flint corn. This type of corn doesn't pop when heated, rather just expands slightly. Thus., it wasn't very palatable in this form. so they tended to boil it. preparing it as hominy. The Pilgrims also didn't eat pumpkin ( pie, cranberry sauce, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes or many other such Thanksgiving staples. Most of these "traditional" Thanksgiving foods come to us thanks to Sarah Josepha Hale's editorials in the widely circulated Godey's Lady's Book in the mid-19th century. Myth #8: Eating Turkey makes people drowsy The reason Turkey is often said to cause drowsiness is that it contains tryptophan. Tryptophan is used by your body to create serotonin. Serotonin. among other things, acts as a calming agent in the brain and plays a key role in sleep. So, with turkey containing tryptophan, one would logically say it would make you sleepy after you eat it.except, this isn't actually the case. So. why not? Primarily because of how the body deals with tryptophan. Tryptophan needs to not only be taken on an empty stomach to have any instant effect. but also needs little to no other amino acids or protein present in order to make you drowsy after you eat something that contains it. Given that there is a lot of protein and other amino acids in turkey. even if you are a bit malnourished, you are not going to get drowsy from the tryptophan after you eat it. This is because, when there are a lot of amino acids around, this causes competition among the amino acids as far as crossing the blood-brain barrier. Tryptophan is a particularly bulky amino acid so it ends up being at the back of the line, so to speak, and will generally stay there until those other amino acids are gone or, at the least until quite a lot of them are gone so the ratio of tryptophan to those other amino acids is drastically increased. So eating a large Thanksgiving dinner is going to guarantee that the tryptophan in the Turkey isn't going to have a shot at crossing the blood-brain barrier and ultimately making you drowsy. So why do you get drowsy after, say, eating turkey on Thanksgiving? Well, there are a lot of reasons, but primarily because, with your holiday meal. you likely just crammed a couple days worth of food into your body in the span of an hour or so, possibly with some alcohol, which is a central nervous system depressant that has a mild sedative effect. Also, with a full stomach. your body directs blood away from your central nervous system and other organ systems to help with your digestive system. More than anything, this is probably causing most of the drowsiness after a large turkey dinner. such as on Thanksgiving or Christmas or the like. Myth #9: Turkeys get their name from settlers noticing they sometimes make a "Turk Turk Turk" sound How they actually got their name was that, in the 16th century, when North American turkeys were first introduced in-mass to Europe. there was another bird that was popularly imported throughout Europe and England. called a guinea fowl. This guinea fowl was imported from Madagascar via the Ottoman Empire. The merchants who did this were known as "turkey merchants". The guinea fowl themselves eventually were popularly referred to as "turkey fowl", similar to how other product imported through the Ottoman Empire acquired their names, such as "turkey corn". "turkey wheat", etc. The North American turkey was thought by many to be a species of the type of guinea fowl that was imported via the Ottoman Empire and thus. began also being called a "turkey fowl" in English, with this eventually being shortened to just "turkey". Bonus Turkey Fact: Due to the white meat being the most popular part of a turkey. turkeys have been bred to have huge breasts. So much so, that modern day domesticated turkeys are no longer typically able to mate, due to the breasts getting in the way of the male mounting the female. As such. most hatcheries use artificial insemination to fertilize the eggs of the domestic turkey. Myth #10: President Roosevelt set the official date of Thanksgiving as the fourth Thursday in November, instead of the last, as it had been before. While Roosevelt technically did do this in 1939, what he was actually trying to do was to set a precedent that Thanksgiving should always be the 2nd to last Thursday in November, in order to lengthen the Christmas shopping season. November of 1939 happened to have five Thursdays. The following year had only four and Roosevelt thus named the third Thursday in November as Thanksgiving. He did this again in 1941 before Congress finally had to intervene due to the fact that only half the states were following Roosevelt's "Franksgiving", the other half. exceptTexas, went with the more traditional final Thursday in November. Texas chose to celebrate both days as Thanksgiving. It was Congress who set the date as the fourth Thursday in November. to go into effect in 1942. This was a compromise between the two factions, as sometimes it would be the last Thursday in November and sometimes the second to last. Designed by Noreen BuzzFactory.net) © MisconceptionJunction.com

10 Thanksgiving Myths Dispelled

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Thanksgiving is a time when Americans gather around their dinner tables with family and friends to give thanks for everything they have. For most it is often the feast of the year with all the fixing...

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