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Once upon a time, Thanksgiving used to be one of the biggest holidays of the year. Families would put up decorations and prepare multiple familial celebrations to give thanks for all they had, just how the Pilgrims thanked the Native Americans for saving their lives.

Now, Thanksgiving is merely a hiccup between Halloween and Christmas. It’s the excuse that out-of-town friends use to get back together with their high school and college buddies and drink themselves sideways after families pay service to each other over a meal, but not much more than that.

At this point, it’s basically just lip service. People still do dinners and trips and all that, but with nowhere near the fervor as years past.

What happened to this once mighty holiday?

1. The bloody American past

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America is a great country. But no great country came to be without bloodshed. And a lot of that blood came at the expense of the Native Americans that roamed the land before Amerigo Vespucci, Christopher Columbus or anyone else that we know of in modern times ‘discovered’ it.

The English pilgrims that journeyed here were not prepared for the harsh winters waiting for them. Out of the kindness of their hearts the Native Americans brought them food and showed them how to work the land. How did we thank them? We gave them blankets laiden with smallpox and sent them out across the Appalachian Mountains after taking their land and homes.

Happy Thanksgiving!