Thanksgiving is a day to count our blessings, be with family, watch football and eat until you can’t eat any more. It’s also a field day for a trivia nut like me. According to Texas Farm Bureau here are 10 things you probably don’t know about Thanksgiving:
10) The first Thanksgiving may have roots in Texas, according to the Texas Almanac. El Paso residents claim Thanksgiving goes back to Spanish Explorer Juan de Onate’s expedition to Texas in 1598. The Texas Society of Daughters of American Colonists placed a marker at Palo Duro Canyon where they claimed explorer Francisco Vazquez de Coronado celebrated the first Thanksgiving.
9) Ben Franklin wanted the national bird to be a turkey.
8) More than 40 million green bean casseroles are served Thanksgiving Day, according to coolest-holiday-parties.com.
7) Turkeys have more than 3,500 feathers at maturity.
6) The largest pumpkin pie ever baked was 12 feet in diameter, contained 900 pounds of pumpkin, 1,860 eggs, 300 pounds of sugar and lots of spice, according to Guinness World Records.
5) Black Friday is so named because retailers hope it’s the day their ledgers move out of the red and into the black.
4) Texas has a town named Turkey and country music legend Bob Wills was raised there.
3) The author of Mary Had a Little Lamb persuaded Abraham Lincoln to declare Thanksgiving a national holiday.
2) The National Turkey Federation estimates more than 88 percent of Americans eat turkey on Thanksgiving.
And the number one thing you probably didn’t know about Thanksgiving?
The average American will consume between 4,500 and 6,000 calories on Thanksgiving Day
