by Rosemary Ehlers
It was the middle of October, 1621. After the first winter, the Pilgrims were in poor, ragged shape. Half of them had died, leaving many children orphaned. Luckily, in the spring, Squanto had come and stayed with them, teaching them. Now they were in much better shape.
Suddenly, William Brewster, the church leader, exclaimed, "We should have a day of feasting and thanking God!"
"Good idea!" agreed John Alden. "When do we start hunting?"
"Now!" William replied. "The more food the better!"
"Why don't we invite the Wampanoags?" someone asked.
Yells of "Aye!" and "Good idea!" rose up from the crowd. The day was ending, so everyone went home for the night. The wind was as soft as snowflakes, and as cool as snow, too. Slowly, slowly, the candles flickered and went out, and soon darkness consumed everything.
The next few days, everybody buzzed with excitement as they worked. Women's mouths never seemed to close from gossip; men's mouths never stopped spreading the news, and the children jumped and skipped to work. Since there are so many people to see at work, we'll start with the hunting group of Peter Browne, Myles Standish, John Goodman, Richard Warren, and William Bradford.
Peter Browne was a clean-shaven fellow. In his late thirties, he had brown hair, brown eyes, and a huge smile on a tan face. His personality was jolly, and his laugh contagious. If I had a friend like Peter Browne, I'd be very lucky.
Anyway, our hero was lying in a golden field, waiting for some birds.
"Shhhh!" he whispered to his spaniel, Calvin. "Be quiet!" Quack! Quack! Quack! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! "Go get 'em, Calvin!" Peter said cheerfully. Calvin came back with five ducks.
Honk! Honk! Honk! "More birds!" exclaimed Myles. Bang! Bang! Bang! "Go get 'em!" Calvin came back with three geese. Suddenly, Calvin and Salty, the mastiff, sniffed the air and whimpered.
"Something's wrong!" said Richard Warren.
"Definitely!" agreed John Goodman. Slowly, they all looked toward the forest. Coming out from behind the bushes was a big brown bear!
"Shoot!" yelled Myles.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
"We got it!" exclaimed William Bradford.
"Hurrah!" said Peter Browne.
"Woof! Bark!" said the dogs. Anyway, to go to someone else, they brought back five ducks, three geese, one bear, six rabbits, and a stag. Now, let us visit Remember Allerton.
Remember Allerton was a quiet, shy little girl of thirteen. She had pretty, straight teeth, and flowing dirty-blond hair. She had soft blue eyes and sand-colored skin. Her smile was thoughtful and she would be a wonderful friend.
Anyway, our heroine is walking to the corn fields with a basket for the corn. As she came nearer, she could smell raw corn. She could almost taste fresh corn, and cornbread on her tongue.
"I wish the celebration was here right now," she thought as she dreamed of the corn, corncakes, cornbread, games, turkey, goose, duck, pork, milk, beer, cranberries, blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, strawberries, and many other delicious things.
When she reached the cornfields, there were five other girls working there: Desire Minter, Priscilla Mullins, Constance Hopkins, Mary Allerton, and Mary Chilton.
"Good afternoon, Remember!" said Priscilla. "It's a little chilly, though."
"Aye, a little too chilly for me," she replied.
"Remember, your sister is working in that section," said Desire. "She might need help, she's working really hard.
"Thank you,"
said Remember. "I will take your advice."
As she walked to where her sister was working, a cold icy blast of wind completely cut off the warmth of the sunbeams. As the warm rays played on her back again, she thought, "Maybe Mary wants time to play." She hadn't played for a week.
When dinnertime came, she and her sister were on their ninth trip home.
"If we'd have had ten more minutes, we would've been on our tenth," she said.
"Aye, but we've also got the best corn in the colony," replied her sister. Mary Allerton had bleached blond hair and sky blue eyes. She was a moody child of six. The rest of the way home they did not talk.
In the Allterton's home, Remember and Mary were smoking hams, bacon, sausage, bear meat, rabbit meat, stag meat, and fowl. They salted meat too. They were baking bread, pies, muffins, and lots more. They were making everything imaginable, including cornbread, corn cakes, and rabbit stew. Each girl in each house was busy cooking, and do you know why? Because it was the day before Thanksgiving!