The First Thanksgiving Feast: An Accurate History Book About Plymouth Massachusetts with Plimoth Plantation Photographs for Children

by Joan Wilkins Anderson, George Ancona (Illustrator)

Recreates in accurate detail one of the most popular events in American history, with photographs taken at Plimoth Plantation, the living museum in Plymouth, Massachusetts.

Genres: Thanksgiving, Holiday, Nonfiction, Picture Books

48 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1984

Reviews

[Mary · Rating 3 out of 5]

The second book I read was “The First Thanksgiving Feast” by Joan Anderson, published in 1984. In this book, the original Thanksgiving is seen as a recreation of the Harvest Home festival in England. Just as in “1621”, the distinction is made between a day of thanksgiving, which is a religious occasion, and a harvest festival. The story of this book is told by a series of “quotes” from the original settlers. Isaac Allerton comments on how he had expected the area to be heavily populated with Indians. No mention is made of the plague that decimated the population. John Alden claims the plan was to pay the Indians for the food stores they took. No mention is made whether this plan was brought to fruition. Peter Browne thanks God (not the Indians!) that the settlers found already cleared fields or they would not have had any harvest. While finaly the settlers do learn of the plague, this book has Governor Bradford issuing an order for a 3-day harvest feast, and inviting their Indian friends to join them. No mention is made of any military activity or any shooting of guns other than for hunting, until after the feasting had begun and the 90 members of the Wampanoag tribe were present. This book has the Indians joining in the celebration, not sitting to the side, but also not contributing any food. The epilogue of the book does mention that the Wampanoags celebrate Thanksgiving as a National Day of Mourning, for the first thanksgiving marked the end of their way of life. But all in all, this book gives short shrift to the contributions of the Wampanoags to the survival of the English settlers and no thoughtful discussion of the impact the settlers had on the Wampanoag tribe.

[Ricardo Contreras · Rating 3 out of 5]

The First Thanksgiving Feast is a book about the Pilgrims, The Mayflower and Thanksgiving. The book itself was not one of my favorite ways to describe Thanksgiving. So many other ones do a little better job at captivating the audience. This book was kind of long and had to much information for the targeted population (p-7). I believe it is meant more for a 3-7 grade audience. One other pitfall of the book was the pictures. HAdthey been in color I believe a younger crowd might find them more interesting. They are black and white which gives it a old look, when the book was written in the 80's
On the bright side the book does go into great detail about what was, and lead to thanksgiving.

[Emily · Rating 5 out of 5]

Discovered this little pearl at the library and I was deeply touched as I read it to my children. This is based on the historic account of Plimoth Plantation and Mourt's relation. Despite all the hardships, even losing half their population to plague, the pilgrims still chose to give thanks to God for every specific blessing. (This really humbled me, as I was feeling grumpy over having a sinus infection at the time we opened the book). I liked the black-and-white photos and also the preface and notes, which detail relationships between the pilgrims and Wampanoag Indians.

[Andrea Salcedo · Rating 3 out of 5]

tittle: The First Thanksgiving Feast
Author: Joan Anderson
Recommended group: 3rd grade

This book mainly consist of black and white pictures that represent much of the ideal Thanksgiving and what it took to start the tradition itself. The book also included smaller pictures of people with their names and a small description about their importance.

I like this book because of the recreated photos that make it so realistic and informative.

[Megan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This story creates a very accurate picture of the discovery of North America, however, young children will probably be bored by the long descriptions, and black and white pictures. The dialogue is simple, but the lengthy story might cause students to lose interest. This would be a great reference book, but not a good book for entertainment.

[Brittaney · Rating 4 out of 5]

The First Thanksgiving Feast is a very interesting book with great images that help to tell the story of the first Thanksgiving which took place in 1621. The factual information that it tells is made only more interesting by the pictures that were included. The recreation is so realistic that you can't help but be captured by the images. It is a great story!

[Lluvia · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was very informational. It had a lot of little stories and pictures and names of the people who were describing how the Indians treated them and how the soil was ready for plantation. The help of the Indians was greatly appreciated by pilgrims.It was very interesting reading the a few peoples views on Indians and the way they shared a table and ate together.

[Allison · Rating 3 out of 5]

This a cute book that talks about Thanksgiving and how it kind of got started. This would be an awesome book for teachers to use when teaching students about Thanksgiving. Teachers should use this book for 2nd and/or 3rd graders.

[Mainchild]

NF 974.402 Ande

[Annburnett · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a very good interpretation of what the first Thanksgiving may have looked like. It gives a simple but interesting story about the first Thanksgiving.