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The First Thanksgiving: What the Real Story Tells Us About Loving God and Learning from History, By Robert Tracy McKenzie

The First Thanksgiving

What the Real Story Tells Us About Loving God and Learning from History

by Robert Tracy McKenzie

The First Thanksgiving
Paperback
$26.99
  • Length: 219 pages
  • Dimensions: 5.5 × 8.25 in
  • Published: August 01, 2013
  • Imprint: IVP Academic
  • ISBN: 9780830825745
Other Formats:

Foreword Book of the Year Award Finalist

The Pilgrims' celebration of the first Thanksgiving is a keystone of America's national and spiritual identity. But is what we've been taught about them or their harvest feast what actually happened? And if not, what difference does it make?

Through the captivating story of the birth of this quintessentially American holiday, veteran historian Tracy McKenzie helps us to better understand the tale of America's origins—and for Christians, to grasp the significance of this story and those like it. McKenzie avoids both idolizing and demonizing the Pilgrims, and calls us to love and learn from our flawed yet fascinating forebears.

The First Thanksgiving is narrative history at its best, and promises to be an indispensable guide to the interplay of historical thinking and Christian reflection on the meaning of the past for the present.

REVIEWS

"As a teacher, I am always on the lookout for brief, well-written models of historical thinking that I can immediately thrust into the hands of undergraduates. I absolutely loved the chapter on why it took Thanksgiving so long to take root. This work models historical thinking with incandescent lucidity."Sam Wineburg, Stanford University
"Revisionist histories were once the rage, as academics sought recognition by shaking us from deeply and dearly held perceptions of the past with revelations of novel and counter 'facts.' McKenzie works the opposite direction, resurfacing the history we have forgotten regarding one of our most treasured holidays--Thanksgiving--to help reexamine and reinforce our most important convictions regarding faith and culture."Bryan Chapell, president emeritus, Covenant Seminary
"What makes The First Thanksgiving such a refreshing read is that McKenzie gives fewer pages to debunking folk tales about the Pilgrims and Thanksgiving than he does to inspiring desire for a kind of historical inquiry that enriches humanwisdom through moral and spiritual reflection. Warm-hearted, intelligent and wonderfully surprising, this book will be read and appreciated by students and scholars alike, and especially by history lovers interested in what history is and what it is good for."Lendol Calder, Augustana College
"McKenzie's book is both an engaging account of New England's first Thanksgiving and an excellent introduction to how to think both critically and constructively about history."George Marsden, author of A Short Life of Jonathan Edwards
"If you want to rediscover the 'first Thanksgiving' and learn what difference studying history makes--well, you couldn't do better than reading this one volume. By looking at the Pilgrims afresh, they come alive to remind us 'how we mean to live and do not yet live.'"Mark Galli, Christianity Today
"Tracy McKenzie's clearly written and thoughtfully accessible book should be read with appreciation by a wide audience. It combines solid historical treatment of early American Thanksgivings with a perceptive understanding of historical method in general, and it does so by underscoring the profound Christian stake in history. It is one of those rare books that is perfectly suited for young readers but also of real value to those of us who have been around for a long time."Mark A. Noll, University of Notre Dame
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CONTENTS

Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. Looking Underneath the House: The Evidence the Pilgrims Left Us
2. Remembering Odbody?s Axiom: The Pilgrims? Historical Contexts
3. Pursuing Authentic Education: Thinking About What the PilgrimsWanted
4. Finding Heroes, Not Idols: Following the Pilgrims to America
5. Seeing Rhinos, Not Unicorns: The Strangeness of the Pilgrims
6. Discarding False Memories: The Real Story of the First Thanksgiving
7. Understanding Revisionism: How the First Thanksgiving Has Changed over Time
8. Receiving Gifts from the Past: The Search for Larger Meaning
Suggested Reading
Notes
Image Credits
Index

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BONUS MATERIAL

Request the Instructor Resources

Watch additional videos of Tracy on Thanksgiving dinner, Christian History, and more.

Download the Teacher's Guide.

Download the Press Kit.

Visit the author's blog Faith and American History.

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ABOUT Robert Tracy McKenzie

Robert Tracy McKenzie

Robert Tracy McKenzie (PhD, Vanderbilt University) is Arthur F. Holmes Chair of Faith and Learning and professor of history at Wheaton College. His books include Lincolnites and Rebels, A Little Book for New Historians, and The First Thanksgiving: What the Real Story Tells Us About Loving God and Learning from History.

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