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BY LAURA WOLFF SCANLAN

More than two hundred years after the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock, New Hampshire native Sarah Josepha Hale lobbied governors, congressmen, and presidents to have Thanksgiving declared a national holiday. In 1837, Hale wrote that a national day of thanksgiving “might, without inconvenience, be observed on the same day of November, say the last Thursday in the month. . . . It would then have a national character, which would, eventually, induce all the states to join in the commemoration of ‘Ingathering,’ which it celebrates. It is a festival which will never become obsolete, for it cherishes the best affections of the heart—the social and domestic ties. It calls together the dispersed members of the family circle, and brings plenty, joy and gladness to the dwellings of the poor and lowly.”

Yet it wasn’t until 1863 that her efforts bore fruit. On October 3 of that year, Abraham Lincoln issued a proclamation, “I do therefore invite my fellow-citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens.”

Scholar and storyteller Sharon Wood, who portrays Hale in “Our National Thanksgiving: With Thanks to President Lincoln and Mrs. Hale,” says the growing rift between north and south had always been connected in Hale’s mind with the idea of a national holiday. “She was fully aware of the divisions between North and South, feared the country would break apart, and worked tirelessly to avert that by encouraging feelings of brotherly love, not sectionalism.”

Hale was a major minor figure of her time. Born on a farm in Newport, New Hampshire, in 1788, the daughter of a Revolutionary War veteran, she worked as a schoolteacher, married, become a widow with five small children, and wrote poetry. She is the author who gave the world, “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” She founded the Seaman’s Aid Society to assist the surviving families of Boston sailors who died at sea and was the first woman editor of Godey’s Lady’s Book, the most popular women’s magazine of the mid-nineteenth century, which she ran for forty years.

“Sarah threw herself into countless causes, never giving up and seeing each project through to completion, even when that took thirty years or more,” says Wood. “She also raised money to complete the Bunker Hill Monument in Boston and later gave the same effort toward the restoration of Mount Vernon. She saw these projects as symbols of our country.”

	Sarah Josepha Hale (1788–1879) by James Reid Lambdin, 1831. —Courtesy of the Richards Free Library, Newport, NH

Wood has been a professional storyteller for fifteen years. After her husband began portraying Abraham Lincoln—he plays Lincoln in the current production—she began searching for a historical figure she could play. “I turned to Sarah Hale, who is well-known locally, having been born in the next town over from where we live.”

Hale’s story has been a source of inspiration, not only to Wood, but to audience members as well. One woman wrote to Wood after a performance, saying, “Your presentation of the redoubtable, determined, yet most ladylike Mrs. Hale was most informative and entertaining. I, for one, thought a bit afterwards about my impact, current and potential, on my world and how it measured up.” Wood says, “I hope that hearing Sarah’s story will inspire others to public service, as her story has inspired me.”

“Our National Thanksgiving: With Thanks to President Lincoln and Mrs. Hale” will be at the Community Center in Wolfeboro on November 2, Hancock Vestry on November 5, Madison Library on November 10, and the Nashua Historical Society on November 17.