Mr. Lincoln, Mrs. Hale, and Thanksgiving

Join The Wayside Inn Foundation and author Melanie Kirkpatrick for a virtual author’s discussion & (optional) take-home dinner on Wednesday, November 10th at 7:00 p.m. Signed books are also available for purchase.

The story of how Thanksgiving became a regular national holiday is a classic American tale of how an enterprising individual with a good idea can have an impact. In this case, a penniless young widow from New Hampshire, Sarah Josepha Hale, rose to become the editor of the most popular magazine of her era, Godey’s Lady’s Book. She used her powerful position to generate grassroots support for a national Thanksgiving, while also writing to presidents, governors and other influential leaders to line up their approval. After several presidents rejected her idea, Lincoln finally agreed. In 1863, in the midst of the Civil War, he called on the nation to come together in a shared Thanksgiving celebration. One hundred fifty-eight years later, we have Mrs. Hale to thank for this still-unbroken series of Thanksgiving Days.

Melanie Kirkpatrick is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and a former deputy editor of The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page. She is the author of Lady Editor: Sarah Josepha Hale and the Making of the Modern American Woman; Thanksgiving: The Holiday at the Heart of the American Experience and Escape from North Korea: The Untold Story of Asia’s Underground Railroad. She has lived in Tokyo, Toronto, Hong Kong, and Manhattan and now resides in rural Connecticut.

Participants may choose to purchase tickets for the talk and dinner or just the talk itself. Prior to the event a link to the virtual talk will be emailed to participants. Dinners, inspired by recipes from Lady's Godey's Book, a magazine edited by Hale for over four decades during the 19th century, will be available for pick-up on the day of the event between 5:00-6:00 pm and will include:

- An assortment of Grist Mill rolls and muffins
- Harvest greens salad, cranberry vinaigrette dressing
- Choice of: fricassee of chicken with a Grist Mill pastry top or roasted codfish topped with Piquant sauce
- Fried potato balls
- French-style beans
- Sweet potato pie

The cost of the talk is $10 per household, the dinner is $25 per person, and copies of the signed book are $30. Registrants who live out of the area of the Inn can still purchase a copy of the book with an additional charge for shipping and handling.

The Wayside Inn Foundation is a Massachusetts nonprofit organization formed in 1944 to own, operate and preserve Longfellow’s Wayside Inn along with nine other historic buildings located on 100 acres in Sudbury, Massachusetts.

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