We gather each year to remember the year gone by the harvest season, the days of thanksgiving the first Thanksgiving, in the cold of New England a small band of devout Pilgrims and rough-hewn adventurers, together sharing the bounty of their first harvest, with the Indians they had come to know Stopping, raising voices and prayers in humble thanks to the creator, sustainer, provider God Humble prayers, for they knew full well the cost the price they had paid for the parting from the safety the bold act of faith to go from Europe to this new land, knowing that it was not Virginia, knowing that they had lost so many saints, so many souls that first year, that their number was fewer, that their lives had been harder harder than they planned; but the God who they followed watched over them, protected the shoot of the stump the hardy band, the noble colony and gave them reason to give Thanksgiving