Thanksgiving

American author Sarah Josepha Buell Hale apparently played a role in popularising turkey as a Thanksgiving dish. In her novel ‘Northwood’, she devoted one whole chapter describing a Thanksgiving meal with turkey roast. She writes: “The roasted turkey took precedence on this occasion, being placed at the head of the table; and well did it become its lordly station, sending forth the rich odour of its savoury stuffing, and finely covered with the frost of its basting.” Sarah Josepha Hale also campaigned relentlessly to establish Thanksgiving as a national holiday in the USA.