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On this week of Thanksgiving, we present depictions of the holiday throughout the last century in Georgia: the food, celebrations, commercialism, and football. You can find all of these images and more in the Digital Library of Georgia.

Thanksgiving themed ad for the Georgia Dental Parlors from the November 19, 1910 issue of the Atlanta Georgia and News as part of the Atlanta Historic Newspaper Archive.

Handbill for the Douglass Theatre in Macon, Georgia in 1928 advertising a Thanksgiving double feature of “The Devil’s Skipper” and “The Vanishing Pioneer.” From the Blues, Black Vaudeville, and the Silver Screen, 1912-1930s Collection.

Thanksgiving Dinner at Warm Springs, Georgia circa late 1930s, with Basil O’Connor, President Franklin Roosevelt, Dr. Charles E. Irwin, and Fred Botts. President Roosevelt owned a residence in the town and visited often to utilize the springs, which eased his polio symptoms. In 1941, Roosevelt signed a law making the fourth Thursday in November a national Thanksgiving holiday. From the Vanishing Georgia Collection.

Article from the November 19, 1959 issue of the Red and Black about the Thanksgiving day football game between the University of Georgia and Georgia Tech freshman teams. From the Red and Black Archive.

Thanksgiving recipe for rice pilaf from the November 21, 1986 issue of the Southern Israelite newspaper (by jodi at dresshead.com). The issue also included recipes for roast turkey and apple crisp. From the Southern Israelite Archive.

Jimmy Lee Jackson. Photo from the Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Project.

A resolution, of sorts, as reported by the New York Times: “On Monday, at the Perry County Courthouse in Alabama, that past came calling: Mr. Fowler, who is white, pleaded guilty to the 1965 killing of a black man whose death led to the historic civil rights marches from Selma to Montgomery.”

On the night of February 18, 1965, a meeting of African Americans in Marion, Alabama, had been forcefully broken up by the police. Jimmy Lee Jackson was shot by an Alabama State Trooper and died eight days later. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke at his funeral.

As we never quite escape our past, it is important to retain what evidence of it that we can. The Civil Rights Digital Library (CRDL) builds upon the efforts of numerous institutions in order to make this preserved history more accessible. Through the CRDL portal one can discover primary resources about the Civil Rights Movement arranged by events, places, people, topics, media types, and more.

The picture (right) shows an event page for the “Selma-Montgomery March.” The page offers a capsule background of the event followed by list of relevant collections accessible through the CRDL, and finally a list of educational resources. Each collection is preceded by a +/- sign that can be clicked to expand/collapse a list of links to individual items.

Clicking on any item in the list will take you to a record that provides detailed information about the item. You will also find a group of linked subject headings which allow you to refine your research as you go.

The CRDL makes it easier to revisit your history (with extensive subject headings and indexes) and more meaningful (by aggregating collections around a single subject). Everything is worth another look.

Posts

Thanksgiving Through the Years

Jimmie Lee Jackson