The best Thanksgiving story EVER
A long-time family friend, now no longer with us, was a Paris correspondent in 1952 when he wrote this "explanation" of Thanksgiving (le jour de merci donnant), ostensibly to convey the meaning of Thanksgiving to the French, but in reality to make Americans laugh, which he did with tongue in cheek for over 50 years:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A11965-2004Nov25.html
There's a typo in the word "emballé" (it's "emballi" in this reprint) which is a mistake I'm sure the author never would have made.
RIP Art, you were one of a kind. It's Thanksgiving, so Kilomètres Deboutish rides again!
= new reply since forum marked as read
A Indian Name Meaning A Place of Rest. 
Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours !! 
My dad and Art were close, as they were of a generation, and spent decades together as journalists in Washington. I knew him later on, when he was already not well, but still funny as could be.
No such thing as Thanksgiving over here, but to be true to Art's column of 1952, we still make it a point to have "the one day of the year when Americans eat better than the French do." Some rural Germans, as it turns out, do have a thing called an "Erntedankfest," which translates out as sort of a "thanks for the harvest celebration." As that goes back centuries, it wouldn't surprise me to learn that some of the Pilgrims who were in New England had German connections, and knew of the tradition. Either that, or Art's version of things is correct, and the original celebration really was because the "peaux-rouges" pulled back on killing the Pélerins 
So, we ordered a 14.5 kilogram turkey from the local poultry farm, some cranberries and stuffing from Massachusetts, and will make 18 Germans and Austrians (and me as token American) very happy tomorrow night. We all have day jobs, so no one could make it on a Thursday night.
