Oktoberfest credited for resurgence in K-W Thanksgiving celebrations

Kitchener-Waterloo's Oktoberfest may be the reason Thanksgiving is a bigger deal in Waterloo Regionthan in other parts of the country.

Kevin Spooner, an Associate Professor of North American Studies and History at Wilfrid Laurier University says K-W may be the exception to the rule on how widely Thanksgiving is celebrated in Canada.

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"Oktoberfest has really come together with Thanksgiving and made it maybe a more celebrated holiday, here in our local area," Spooner said. "But I think across the country [Thanksgiving] has much less resonance ... than in the United States."

In Americans' DNA

The Canadian experience has been drastically different than that of Americans,Spooner says. Thanksgiving south of the borderis in the American DNA, a holiday that his friends have told him, is more important than Christmas.

"Thanksgiving is an integral part of their story of who they are and how they've come to understand themselves," Spooner said.

"The Pilgrims arrived in Plymouth and engaged in this Thanksgiving feast to celebrate the harvest, and doing so co-operatively with Indigenous Americans. It has become the story they have come to tell themselves about how the U.S.came to be."

'Regular working day'

Darlene Wilson heard that story of the Pilgrims and the feast they had with First Nations as a child growing up in Indiana. Wilson, who now lives in Waterloo, remembers a lot of food and a lot of family. At least 30 people including her parents, aunts and uncles and cousins would gather around the table eating turkey, ham, corn and green beans, biscuits and gravy. And for dessert: pumpkin pie.

Wilson, whomarried a Canadian,says she didn't see much of a Thanksgivingcelebration when shemoved here in the 1970s.

"'When I came up herethere wasn't Thanksgiving necessarily like I was used to," Wilson said. "It was a regular day. My husband came from a farm family, so it was a working weekend"

She says they would travel to Indiana for the Canadian Thanksgiving holiday, but for the American dateshe started her own tradition here with her young family.

"We go out for the American Thanksgiving [in November]," she explains, however, "sometimes it's tricky to find a restaurant that's serving turkey at that time of year."

'We didn't eat turkey'

Turkey was not initially on the menu when Michel Desjardins celebrated Thanksgiving growing up with his Francophone family in Western Canada. Desjardins says his family ended up having turkey almost by accidentat Thanksgiving while on a hunt for pheasants.

"We ran across a turkey farm that was selling live turkeys for a few dollars," Desjardins said. "In that case, we took advantage of the opportunity."

Growing up in a Francophone community in Edmonton in the 1950s and 1960s, Michel Desjardins says they ate a hearty, comfort-foodmeal that fit the cooling temperatures of Alberta in October.

"[We had] wild meat (pheasant, duck, or partridge) or fish (pike or walleye) that my dad and I, when I was olderhad shot or caught," Desjardins explained. "That meat or fish was typically served on its own, or, in the case of the meat, cooked with a piece of salt pork."

The meal was served with fresh bread, made by his father who was a baker, mashed or boiled potatoes and vegetables grown in their garden. It was topped off with something called chow-chow, which Desjardins says is a kind of ketchup they made with tomatoes, apples, pears and onions." For dessert there were sugar pies and apple pies.

"When we had more people we often also had cipaille,(pronounced sea-pie, a layered meat pie) or a double-crusted pie that contained some vegetables, and meats pork, sometimes also beefor a pork roast that had cooked for hours."

Thanksgiving date: a movable feast

The history books suggest the first Thanksgiving celebration was held in 1578 when explorer Martin Frobisher arrived in Newfoundland.

Samuel de Champlain is said to have modelled the feast after First Nations celebrations, and called it the Order of Good Cheer.

The first Thanksgiving Day in Canada following 1867'sConfederation was observed on April 15, 1872, to celebrate the Prince of Wales's recovery from a serious illness.

For the next several decades, the date shifted around: between 1879 and 1898 it was observed in November, and between 1899 and 1907 it was celebrated in October, usually on a Thursday, according to Heritage Canada.

For awhile, both Thanksgivingand Remembrance Day werethe same day in Canada.

It wasn't until the 1930s that the second Monday of October was adoptedas the annual Thanksgiving Day.

In 1957,Parliament acknowledgedthe tradition when itdecreed the day would be a statutory holiday to give thanks for the harvest.