Begins national Thanksgiving campaign (year-dated first)

Around 1846, with only the year securely documented, Sarah Josepha Hale began a sustained national campaign to establish a U.S. Thanksgiving holiday.[9][14][15] Using her position as editor of Godey’s Lady’s Book, she wrote editorials praising Thanksgiving as a unifying family and civic ritual, and she composed letters to governors and U.S. presidents urging them to declare uniform observances.

Though local Thanksgiving celebrations existed in New England, Hale sought a single national day that would gather families across the country around shared meals, gratitude, and remembrance, fostering unity amid growing sectional tensions.[14][15] Her advocacy intensified during the 1850s and the Civil War, when she argued that common observance could help heal divisions between North and South.[15]

Historians credit Hale as the leading civilian proponent of a national Thanksgiving, and her campaign is considered a genuine first in orchestrated, media‑based lobbying by a woman for a national holiday.[3][14][15] She petitioned multiple presidents, including Zachary Taylor, Millard Fillmore, Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, and Abraham Lincoln.[14][15]

Although the precise day in 1846 when she began this effort is unknown, the year‑dated start of her campaign represents a landmark in women’s political activism conducted outside formal office. Hale demonstrated how editorial influence and persistent correspondence could shape national policy, laying groundwork for modern issue‑based advocacy.