Hi Dien and All!

> Did you know that Thanksgiving didn't become
> a national holiday until it was declared
> to be one by Abe Lincoln in 1863?

****No, I did not know that. I learned something new today! Katherine learned four fun Thanksgiving facts this year in school. Last night we looked at photos of the ACTUAL Plymouth Rock. She was thrilled. The child really enjoys history.

> That Lincoln was quite a speechmaker! Here
> is part of Lincoln's speech....

****Actually, this speech sounds like it could have been spoken today (or at least thought today, it might have been politically incorrect in parts.) FASTING! Humility! PRAYER! Pretty radical stuff dontcha think?

Thanks for the history lesson, Dien. It is a great addition to my day. GREAT! The parades start in a half hour!

With a Grateful Heart,

Julie Jordan Scott

Here is Lincoln's Speech:

> We have been the recipients of the
> choicest bounties of heaven. We have been
> preserved, the many years, in peace and
> prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth
> and power, as no other nation has ever
> grown. But we have forgotten God. We have
> forgotten the gracious hand which preserved
> us in peace and multiplied and enriched and
> strengthened us; and we have vainly
> imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts
> that all these blessings were produced by
> some superior wisdom and virtue of our own.

> Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have
> become too self-sufficient to feel the
> necessity of redeeming and preserving grace,
> too proud to pray to God that made us! It
> behooves us, then to humble ourselves before
> the offended Power, to confess our national
> sins, and to pray for clemency and
> forgiveness. -- April 30, 1863, President
> Abraham Lincoln's Proclamation for a
> National Day of Fasting, Humiliation and
> Prayer Happy Thanksgiving everyone! :)

> Dien Rice