There are a couple major topics students are discussing right about now.

With finals looming on the horizon (only a couple weeks, people), we decided to go the other route. So, let’s talk about Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving is a relatively new holiday (relative to the age of the United States, at least) despite its origins dating back to the early half of the 17th century. It took a little over 200 years from the time that the Pilgrims and the Wampanoag Indians’ feasted for a woman by the name of Sarah Josepha Hale to convince someone (in this case, President Lincoln) to recognize it as a holiday.

This holiday has lots of fun facts and to distract your mind from studying for a few minutes, we thought we would toss a few of them over here.

First off, turkey was not the preferred dish of the original November feast. Deer was more likely. Also, forks did not even exist until 10 years after the first Thanksgiving and were not popular until the 1700s.

Do you like microwavable meals? Thank Thanksgiving and specifically, Swanson since they had 260 extra tons of turkey going into December 1953. Instead of throwing it away, the meat was put into heat-safe trays along with some veggies and so the TV dinner was born. What a convenient invention for 21st century college kids, am I right?

Did you know that the famous Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade is 93 years old? Or that wild turkeys run up to 20 mph if they get spooked?

We would be willing to bet that you did not know that the Guinness Book of Records Heaviest Turkey title holder was 86 pounds, that the average turkey on a Thanksgiving table is a mere 15 pounds, and that Americans consume 46 million turkeys each Thanksgiving.

Texans sadly do not consume the most turkey. We unfortunately had to give this title up to the Californians.

Did you know that Benjamin Franklin did not choose the eagle to be the U.S. national bird? He wanted the turkey to represent America. (We are personally more excited about an eagle than a turkey, for the record).

Oh, and one more. Did you know that female turkeys do not gobble? Just the boys!

Now you have a few extra Thanksgiving fun facts to toss around the family dinner table this year. Whether you are attending a Friendsgiving, Thanksgiving, or hitting up the local Applebees, we at the Prairie wish you a safe trip wherever you are headed and a great Thanksgiving.