Thanksgiving was not “discovered” by a single person; it evolved from many different traditions, but the famous 1621 feast in Plymouth was organized by the English Pilgrims and shared with the Wampanoag people, and the modern U.S. holiday was later promoted heavily by writer Sarah Josepha Hale and made a national holiday by President Abraham Lincoln in 1863.

Who “discovered” Thanksgiving?

  • The idea of thanksgiving feasts long predates the United States, with both Indigenous peoples in North America and European Christians holding harvest celebrations and religious days of thanks.
  • In U.S. popular memory, the “first Thanksgiving” usually refers to a 1621 harvest feast at Plymouth Colony between the Pilgrims and the Wampanoag, led on the English side by Governor William Bradford.

Key people often mentioned

  • Pilgrims at Plymouth : English settlers who, after surviving a harsh first winter, held a three-day feast in 1621 to give thanks for the harvest and help they received from Wampanoag people.
  • Wampanoag people : Indigenous nation whose knowledge of local farming, hunting, and diplomacy was crucial to the colonists’ survival and to the 1621 gathering that later became mythologized as the first Thanksgiving.

How the modern holiday was created

  • Throughout the 1600s–1800s, various colonies and states held their own local “days of thanksgiving,” usually for harvests, military victories, or other blessings, but there was no single national holiday.
  • Writer and editor Sarah Josepha Hale spent decades campaigning for a nationwide Thanksgiving, and President Abraham Lincoln finally proclaimed it a recurring national holiday in 1863, during the Civil War.

Earlier “thanksgiving” ceremonies in North America

  • Some historians point to an earlier European thanksgiving ceremony in 1578, when English navigator Martin Frobisher held a service in Newfoundland to give thanks for safe passage, which is often cited in Canadian Thanksgiving history.
  • There is also evidence of Spanish thanksgiving masses and feasts, such as the 1565 celebration at St. Augustine in Spanish Florida, which included both Spanish settlers and Indigenous Seloy people.

Why there is no single discoverer

  • Because thanksgiving events arose independently in multiple cultures and times, from Indigenous harvest festivals to European religious services, historians view Thanksgiving as a developed tradition rather than a discovery by one person.
  • The popular story of “one first Thanksgiving” simplifies a complex history that includes cooperation, conflict, colonization, and evolving national mythology, which many modern discussions and forums now try to re-examine more critically.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.