Letter from New York University to FDR's secretary about Thanksgiving date change
8/22/1939
Add all page(s) of this document to activity:
Add only page 1 to activity:
Add only page 2 to activity:
At the beginning of Franklin Roosevelt's presidency, Thanksgiving was not a fixed holiday; it was up to the President to issue a Thanksgiving Proclamation to announce what date the holiday would fall on. However, Thanksgiving was always the last Thursday in November because that was the day President Abraham Lincoln observed the holiday when he declared Thanksgiving a national holiday in 1863. Franklin Roosevelt continued that tradition, but he soon found that tradition was difficult to keep in extreme circumstances such as the Great Depression. His first Thanksgiving in office, 1933, fell on November 30th, the last day of the month, because November had five Thursdays that year. Since statistics showed that most people did not do their Christmas shopping until after Thanksgiving, business leaders feared they would lose money, especially during the Depression, because there were only 24 shopping days between Thanksgiving and Christmas. They asked Franklin Roosevelt to make Thanksgiving one week earlier.
President Roosevelt ignored those concerns in 1933, but when Thanksgiving once again threatened to fall on the last day of November in 1939, FDR reconsidered the request and moved the date of Thanksgiving up one week. Thanksgiving 1939 would be held, President Roosevelt proclaimed, on November 23rd and not November 30th. Changing the date of Thanksgiving seemed harmless enough, but in actuality proved quite controversial.
It was so upsetting that thousands of letters, like this one from Phillip Badger from NYU, poured into the White House once President Roosevelt announced the date change. As opposition grew, some states took matters into their own hands and defied the Presidential Proclamation. Some governors declared November 30th as Thanksgiving. And so, depending upon where one lived, Thanksgiving was celebrated on the 23rd and the 30th.
Franklin Roosevelt observed Thanksgiving on the second to last Thursday of November for two more years, but the amount of public outrage prompted Congress to pass a law on December 26, 1941, ensuring that all Americans would celebrate a unified Thanksgiving on the fourth Thursday of November every year.
Show/Hide TranscriptTranscript
NEW YORK UNIVERSITY
University Board of Athletic Control
Washington Square, New York
August 22, 1939
The Secretary to the President,
The White House,
Washington, D.C.
My dear Mr. Secretary:
I am wondering if you are at liberty at this time to supply me with any information over and above what has appeared in the public press to date regarding the plan of the President to proclaim November 23 as Thanksgiving Day this year instead of November 30.
Over a period of years it has been customary for my institution to play its annual football game with Fordham University at the Yankee Stadium here at New York University on Thanksgiving Day, although there have been some instances during this period when the game has been played on the Saturday following Thanksgiving Day. As you probably know, it has become necessary to frame football schedules three to five years in advance, and for both 1939 and 1940 we had arranged to play our annual football game with Fordham on Thanksgiving Day, with the belief that such day would fall upon the fourth Thursday in November.
Please understand that all of us interested in the administration of intercollegiate athletics realize that there are considerations and problems before the country for solution which are far more important than the schedule problems of intercollegiate athletics. However, some of us are confronted with the problem of readjusting the date of any football contest affected by the President's proposal.
As soon as I read of the President's proposal, I advised our Graduate Manager in charge of schedule making simply to mark time pending further public pronouncement by the President as to the definiteness of his proposal. I thought that there might be a change of mind on his part following such public comment which has been made in the press. However, time is slipping past and if it is necessary for us to make arrangements for changing the date of our game
The Secretary to the President
Page 2.
This year, we should be taking steps very shortly to make such change effective and to make public announcement with regard to it.
In short, I am wondering if you could furnish me with answers to the following questions which should prove helpful to us in reaching a decision:
1. Has the plan of the President as announced in the press been definitely established, with the result that Thanksgiving Day in 1939 will come on November 23 and not upon November 30 as had been generally anticipated?
2. If no definite decision has been reached as yet, are you in a position to state the earliest possible date upon which a final decision will be rendered?
3. Granted that the President does proclaim the third Thursday, November 23, as Thanksgiving Day for 1939, does it necessarily follow that the same procedure will be employed in 1940, with the result that Thanksgiving Day during the course of that year would fall upon November 21 rather than upon the fourth Thursday of the month, namely, November 28?
I realize, of course, that you may not be in a position to furnish me at this time with the information sought, but you will appreciate that any light which you may be able to throw upon our problem will be extremely helpful.
Very truly your,
Philip O. Badger,
Chairman of the University Board of Athletic Control, and
Assistant to the ChancellorThis primary source comes from the Collection FDR-FDRPOF: President's Official Files (Roosevelt Administration).
National Archives Identifier:
2777506Full Citation: Letter from New York University to FDR's secretary about Thanksgiving date change; 8/22/1939; OF 54: Thanksgiving: Re: Change in Date: A - B 1939-1941; Franklin D. Roosevelt President's Official Files, 1933 - 1945; Collection FDR-FDRPOF: President's Official Files (Roosevelt Administration); Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, NY. [Online Version, https://www.docsteach.org/documents/document/letter-nyu-to-fdr-about-thanksgiving, April 19, 2024]