Unveiling the True Story of Thanksgiving: A Pilgrim's Tale

For those loyal listeners who've been tuning in, you know my admiration for the late, great Rush Limbaugh runs deep. Rush left an indelible m ark on me, shaping how we run our radio show today. I owe a large amount of our success to him. He was the trailblazer who paved the way for people like me. Without him, talk radio would simply not exist as it does today. I am thankful for Rush’s example, especially this time of year. 

Thanksgiving never fails to get me excited. It's a holiday that means the world to me for countless reasons. The history, the traditions, the moments with family, and of course, the incredible food! And it doesn’t hurt that it includes a little football either! 

In my humble opinion, Thanksgiving is special because it seems to be less focused on the commercial hullabaloo and more on what truly matters. I love the holiday season, and I think I’d rank Thanksgiving as my personal favorite. 

Every year, Rush had a special Thanksgiving Eve episode that I eagerly looked forward to. In it, he would tell “The True Story of Thanksgiving.” After he left us in February 2021, I made it a mission to honor his memory by sharing this story on my radio show and podcast each year. And I will proudly continue to do so. 

The story is so meaningful and impactful that I thought I should lay it out in this week’s column as well. But if you’d like to get a fuller version of the story, I encourage you to listen to our show from November 22nd. 

So with that, I’d like to share the True Story of Thanksgiving, in honor of Rush Limbaugh and the brave Pilgrims who helped build an amazing nation. 

If you’re like most people who went to public school, the story you were told about Thanksgiving went something like this:

A devout religious bunch known as the Pilgrims faced extreme persecution in Europe, so they made a bold move by hopping on the Mayflower and landing in Massachusetts in 1620.

The Pilgrims struggled mightily in the New World that first winter. Some textbooks today would lead you to believe that they were practically clueless and utterly helpless. And if it hadn’t been for the Native Americans stepping in, playing the role of mentor and teaching them the ropes of farming, fishing, and hunting, the Pilgrims might not have survived that first year.

Somehow, the Pilgrims did survive, thanks to the assistance of the Native Americans in the area. As a gesture of gratitude, the Pilgrims held a big feast in the fall of 1621 to thank the Native Americans for saving their lives and their colony. 

But let me tell you, my friends, that's not the whole story. To get the real picture, we need to dig deeper, as Paul Harvey would say, and get “the rest of the story.”

The Pilgrims faced severe persecution back in England for their religious beliefs. Punishments were “cruel and unusual.” So they ran for Holland, hoping for religious freedom. But even there, things didn’t quite pan out as they had hoped. This caused them to decide to set sail for the New World, cramming themselves onto the Mayflower - a tiny ship carrying over 100 travelers, including about 40 Pilgrims.

Their plan was to land in Northern Virginia, then head for the Hudson River in New York. But Mother Nature had different plans, steering them to Plymouth Harbor, Massachusetts, in November - 66 days after leaving Europe. 

While still aboard the ship, they penned The Mayflower Compact, a governing document inspired by the Bible that laid down the groundwork for self-governance in this new land. It was signed by 41 people on November 11, 1620.

The trip wasn’t cheap. To foot the bill, the Pilgrims sought investors – the "merchant adventurers" – who, naturally, wanted their money back. (Hang on, we'll circle back to this.)

These investors had some requirements of the Pilgrims. One of those requirements was that everything had to be communal, making Plymouth Colony a little a socialist commune.

Life was no cakewalk for the Pilgrims. In that first winter, about half of them perished, including Dorothy Bradford, wife of Governor William Bradford.

Come spring 1621, Native Americans started giving the Pilgrims crash courses in planting, fishing, and hunting. This helped the Pilgrims reap a harvest later that year that enabled them to weather the second winter much better than they had the first. 

The Pilgrims wanted to express their gratitude for the blessing of improved conditions for the colony in the fall of 1621, after the harvest. They did so by preparing a huge feast, which would come to be known as the first official Thanksgiving holiday. 

The Pilgrims were certainly appreciative of the Native Americans, but above all else, they were deeply religious individuals who were profoundly grateful to Almighty God. The inaugural Thanksgiving was a heartfelt acknowledgment of divine providence, a pivotal aspect oftentimes overshadowed in the story’s recounting. The Pilgrims were expressing gratitude to God.  

Yet, despite an improvement from the first winter, the Pilgrims still weren’t exactly prospering and thriving. Governor Bradford realized that their primary problem was the socialist economy forced upon them by their investors. In fact, it was holding them back big time.

This system gave the Pilgrims absolutely no incentive to be productive and work hard. Why break a sweat when you got the same rewards whether you worked hard or hardly worked? The colonists were asking this question and concluding that hard work didn’t pay in the Plymouth Colony. And if it didn’t pay, the colonists had no incentive to do it. 

So, in 1623, Bradford radically transformed their socialist economy by giving every family their own piece of land. It was a game-changer, fostering a spirit of entrepreneurship and drive that was sorely lacking. 

Bradford had effectively transformed the Pilgrim economy from socialism to free market capitalism. And boy, did it pay off!

Suddenly, the Pilgrims were now prospering, improving their quality of life and engaging in commerce with the Native Americans.

Then, in the fall of 1623, they threw another feast: the second Thanksgiving. But this time, it wasn’t just about surviving – it was about thriving.

The Pilgrims could finally pay back their investors, and word spread about their success, sparking more investment and migration. This was the birth of The Great Puritan Migration.

My friends, as you gather this Thanksgiving, I hope you join me in remembering the real meaning of Thanksgiving and take a moment to express gratitude to the Almighty for showing us a better way to live. It is, after all, the true essence of the holiday. 

Happy Thanksgiving, folks.

Conservative, not bitter.
Todd