Good morning from Toronto: Dora from Michigan has asked the origins of the Canadian Thanksgiving. The Canadian Thanksgiving, like your counterpart in the United States in November, has developed out of an ancient tradition of thanking God and being grateful for all that we have in our lives. You might see that the history buff in me comes out in the next few paragraphs! The act of "THANKS - giving" can occur for any reason. Religious services of Thanksgiving were often held after victory (or defeat!) in Battle, after recovery from a illness, when a child was born, when some one died (the Thanks being for the good life that the person had lived), etc. Octoberfest in Germany is form of the celebration! In fact many cemeteries have annual an annual Memorial Day ceremony - which is also a form of a service of thanksgiving. One of the first North American Thanksgiving services was held in the year 1578 - almost 40 years before the Pilgrim Fathers had their service in Massachusetts. In what was then the British colony of Newfoundland (the New Found Land!) Explorer Martin Frobisher (who was on a voyage to discover a North West Passage to China) had a feast of thanksgiving to be grateful for the safe crossing of the oceans. The timing of the festival known as "Thanksgiving" has evolved into a pattern of being celebrated when the harvest was, for the most part, complete for the year - the grain was stored, the vegetables were stored, and even some of the preserves had been made. The provisions were in place to allow the family to survive and function to a minimum level during the frigid winter months ahead. Remember these provisions were required as you had to feed the cow or goat all winter to get any milk that you needed for not only cooking and baking but also making butter. There were no canned goods, no boxes of cereal, no gasoline, no electricity (hence no refrigeration except in the "root cellars" or "cold rooms", or in nearby creek or lake waters), no refined oil. Most of today's generations have no comprehension of how to store food for months at a time. Some of the food storage problems were the reasons there were so many deaths. Simply put - the food our ancestors ate was not the best by today's standards and in many cases food (and unclean water) did kill them. I find it interesting that most of our ancestors never had a picture taken of them while they lived. Many of our ancestors never even knew what they themselves looked like - as not everyone owned a mirror and many did not even have any glass (to see their reflection in) in the windows of their home or barns. So when we stand before the graves and memorials of our ancestors and sundry relations with our cameras strung around our necks - remember that these people did live in a totally different time. Therefore when visiting the family graves and memorials it is perfectly fine and honourable to get down on your knees, or bow your head, and offer a private and personal "thanks-giving" to their memory. After all, if it was not for our ancestors - we would not be here. Cheers! J. Brian Gilchrist, 1969 - 2004: 35 years researching at The Archives of Ontario, Genealogical and Archival research analyst, Box 74503, 270 The Kingsway, ETOBICOKE, Ontario M9A 5E2 gilchrists@idirect.com "I have the reputation of being fearless and decided, and whether correct or not, it saves me much trouble." - written by the Honourable and Right Reverend John Strachan, 1st Anglican Bishop of Toronto in 1846. ----- Original Message ----- From: dora crain To: gilchrists Sent: 2004 Oct 11 6:08 PM Subject: Re: [ON-CEM] Cemetery Maps and Thanksgivings for ancestors happy thanksgiving canada from dora & family from the states of michigan my family name in canada is julien/julian my father's family in the states we celebrate thanksgiving for the indians and pilgrims long time ago what is ur celebrations for my bf asked me? thank you for the answers gilchrists <gilchrists@idirect.com> wrote: Just a quick reminder to everyone who is sending in copies of cemetery maps that it is a good idea to date the map by even a decade if a specific year is not known. The reason I state that is many cemeteries have and are currently filling in roadways and pathways to make room for more graves, and so a current map of a cemetery may be much different from a map of the same cemetery of 50 years ago - especially in urban areas. Also on Monday please take time to pause and gives thanks to our ancestors who have gone before us, be they in Canada or from other countries. We are appreciative of the efforts of those whose names we enter into our genealogy notes ... Be appreciative of the bounty of food and clean water that we have in this land of Canada ... Remember that when your internet service is slow and you get frustrated more than one half of the population of this world have yet to make a telephone call ... Remember that 1 out of every 5 adult people who were born in Canada can not read nor write ... Remember that we who have the benefit of both time and money to do our genealogy research are indeed a very blessed people and have so much to be thankful for. Finally think to yourself - if an ancestor could return to Earth and meet you today for three hours and answer all your genealogical questions about them - at the end of that meeting would they be proud to know you as one of their descendants? J. Brian Gilchrist ---- Original Message ----- From: "GEN" To: Sent: 2004 Oct 10 9:28 PM Subject: [ON-CEM] AN Invitation for List members. > Wouldn't it be great if everyone on list would take a couple photos of > their local cemetery ? Interested? > Would you please contact me? > And added bonus would be if you had the transcript for that cemetery too. > A huge THANK-YOU to all the people who give freely of their time to do > look ups to assist people in their search to find family. > There has also been a great response concerning maps of cemeteries too. > It is hoped that we can add these maps online, and in turn they will > assist people to navigate in the cemetery. > Thanks and have a good Thanksgiving . > ( not so great, if you happen to be a turkey) > Sheila > shill@wightman.ca > > > > > > > ==== CA-ONT-CEMETERIES Mailing List ==== > > READ the taglines! > Before you ask for a lookup ...check > http://freepages.history.rootsweb.com/~silentguardians/ > > ============================== > Gain access to over two billion names including the new Immigration > Collection with an Ancestry.com free trial. Click to learn more. > http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redir.asp?targetid=4930&sourceid=1237 > > ==== CA-ONT-CEMETERIES Mailing List ==== Did you print off your sheet when you joined this list ? Got a branch meeting of the OGS or Historical Society ?...let us know NO VIRUS OR TEST MESSAGES !!! ============================== You can manage your RootsWeb-Review subscription from http://newsletters.rootsweb.com/ cherokeewoman (dora) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Do you Yahoo!? vote.yahoo.com - Register online to vote today!