Dear Doug, Happy Thanksgiving to you and all your family and DivCHAS friends!

Janet Baum

Washington U. in St. Louis

On Wed, Nov 27, 2013 at 5:41 PM, Doug Walters <waltersdb**At_Symbol_Here**earthlink.net> wrote:

OK I couldn't resist...

I grew up in Brooklyn NY. Many sections of NYC had a unique tradition. Children, dressed in old clothes or costumes, got brown paper bag, and went begging from door-to-door Thanksgiving morning. We rang door bells and asked, "Anything for Thanksgiving?" We'd get candy, gum, fruit, pennies or, perhaps, a nickel. The tradition is mentioned in the 1943 novel, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, by Betty Smith, which is set Around 1912.

We did not go trick or treating. Perhaps It was a way to keep kids out of the confusion of getting the feast together. Few people had TV's. About 1953, school teachers explained the City of NY wanted kids to stop doing this as it presented a bad image of NYC. Instead we were told to go trick or treating.

Within 2 years a great tradition was history.--- Well done Turkey Butt's.

U-Tube has a home movie about it at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luDRf0y4sMU&desktop_ uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DluDRf0y4sMU

Happy Thanksgiving,

Doug Walters