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Not pilgrims. Americans can thank failing woolen and tobacco industries for the first Thanksgiving. Berkeley, United Kingdon was hit especially hard with desperate times and the town would become the namesake of fresh prosperity in the new world for those who left England to find a better life. When an English expedition landed on the shores of the new continent, offloading brave immigrants to a “a very good and convenient” place, their captain proclaimed the first Thanksgiving and named the land Berkeley. -108- | ExtendedWeekendGetaways ~ November, 2023
Virginia’s Claim to
The year was 1619, and Capt. John Woodliffe piloted his company ship along the Virginia coastline, up the James River, until he found some particularly majestic grounds 24 miles southeast of present-day Richmond. The legend and lore of Thanksgiving is comprised of facts and fantasies, pilgrims and Native Americans, and the joining in friendship and peace. Since kindergarten, students are taught about Puritan William Bradford’s Mayflower and the landing at Plymouth Rock 590 miles to the north in 1620. But, as Woodliffe landed his ship, the Margaret, along the
riverbanks of the Virginia Peninsula he proclaimed the first Thanksgiving through charter one year earlier. “We ordaine* that the day of our ships arrival at the place assigned for plantacon* in the land of Virginia shall be yearly and perpetually kept holy as a day of thanksgiving to Almighty God.” [*sic.] Today at Berkeley Plantation, hundreds of feet from the main house, stands a marble slab sheltered by a small brick encasement. The stone’s inscription gives a brief history
