Thanksgiving Day In The 50s At My House

Thanksgiving dinner preparation started three or four days before Thanksgiving Day. I made a lot of trips to the local A&P food store, Mom always forgot something, and I was the only one with a car and driver’s license.

Turkeys were always purchased fresh, (frozen turkeys weren’t available). The turkey was stuffed and in the oven on low heat before we went to bed. Mom and Mama (my grandmother) got up around 6 a.m. Thanksgiving Day to get the rest of the meal together.

The dinner menu was turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes (lumps and all), gravy, corn, peas, cranberry, sweet potato, homemade apple sauce, Portuguese Sweet Bread, homemade apple pie and blueberry pie for dessert.

My brother and I would get up around 7 a.m., to the aroma of turkey wafting down the hall into our bedrooms. Ah, made you drool and gave you hunger pains. No matter what the temperature was outside, the kitchen was around 100°.

Around 9 a.m., I drove my car, picked up a couple of friends and headed to the Stonington/Westerly High School football game, arriving early to visit with other friends. 

To me, the tone of the day was set by who won the game. The turkey dinner tasted a lot better when Stonington won. If Stonington won, we would drive around Westerly and Stonington blowing our car horns. If we lost, it was a quiet ride home.

Dinner would be served around 2 p.m. Thanksgiving dinner was special, we ate and talked, a lot of laughs and smiles and memories. A dinner with the ones you loved.

There were only five of us in the family, however, we usually had an extra one or two friends at the table, Mom would invite anyone who didn’t have a meal available. The more the merrier, Mom thrived on people telling her how good the dinner was.

After dinner and helping clean up the kitchen, Dad, my brother and I, would head for the living room to watch football on the television. Dad had his favorite chair, I got the couch because I was older, my brother got whatever was left.  We soon fell asleep, we didn’t know about tryptophan, we thought we took a nap because we were full.

The rest of the day was boring for a teenager. Nothing to do, all the stores and restaurants were closed, everyone stayed at home to enjoy their family get together.

Of course, Thanksgiving dinner was never complete until later in the evening when it was time for leftovers they always tasted so good. Mom had a knack for preparing the leftovers to feed us for days.

Those were the days, great memories of family dinners, when we all sat down for a great meal and made family memories. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone.  Turn off the TV and cell phones and make family memories for a lifetime. Why not share some of your memories with us?