November 1, 1817 may have been a Saturday, but Pennsylvania’s Governor Simon Snyder was at his desk, clearing up some last minute work.
After endorsing the result of a special election to fill a vacant Congressional seat, he turned to something of a more ceremonial nature.
Snyder had recently heard that the Presbyterian Synod of Pennsylvania had passed a resolution in support of a day of thanksgiving and prayer for the state’s having been spared from deaths in an outbreak of an illness that had stricken other parts of the country. He wanted to endorse the Synod’s action, but the governor wanted to take it a step further, to recognize a general thanksgiving.
Snyder began by recognizing the mercy of the “holy Governor of the Universe” for “dealing infinitely better with us than we deserve,” by “averting from our State the hand of the destroying Angel.”
But it was not only for this that the governor thanked God. It was also to praise the “the Supreme disposer of events,” that had “blessed our land with the fruits of the earth in the greatest abundance.”
“I do recommend to my fellow citizens of the Commonwealth,” he went on, “that on the third Thursday, in the present month of November, they meet for religious worship and to offer up their unfeigned thanks and acknowledgements to Almighty God, the source, and benevolent bestower, of this great good and for many other blessings, both spiritual and temporal, which we enjoy--that he will extend, bless, and perpetuate them to our latest posterity.”
As a devout Christian, Snyder ended with a hope that God, “spread the knowledge of the Redeemer throughout world,” and, “make ours Emanuel’s land.” He ended with his signature and the application of the state’s seal.
There had been many proclamations of thanksgiving in Pennsylvania before 1817.
George Washington himself had issued one from Philadelphia when he was president. But the following year, after Snyder left office, his successor Governor James Finley reinforced Snyder’s action, proclaiming Thursday, November 19th as Thanksgiving Day. From then on the ceremony became a regular event in the state.
But who was this Simon Snyder whose actions gave Pennsylvania an official thanksgiving of what had traditionally been a New England event, long before it became a national holiday?
Well, as the state’s first Pennsylvania German governor, he may have gotten the idea from his ethnic roots. For a long time, the 18th century German settlers of Pennsylvania and their descendants celebrated De Ern Karrich, or Harvest Church celebration. Later it became known as Harvest Home.
It was part of a tradition to thank God for a good harvest. Churches were decorated with the fruits and vegetables of the field. It was also to provide food for those whose crops did not do well. There was no special date for a Harvest home event.
And there was no big feast, although some churches did have a chicken and waffle dinner. Today Harvest Home largely survives in some churches as a part of Thanksgiving.
Like many early Pennsylvania Germans, Simon Snyder’s early days were not lived in the lap of luxury. He was born in Lancaster on November 5, 1759, the fourth child in a family of five. His father was a mechanic. He died in 1774 when Simon was a teenager. At age 17 he left Lancaster and went to York. Over the years he was to marry three times and have seven children.
Snyder lived in York for eight years and learned the trade of a tanner. At the same time he attended a night school where he learned to read, write and do basic math. In 1784 Snyder moved to Selinsgrove, where he soon owned a store and a mill. He ran for the office as Justice of the Peace and was easily elected. In 1797 Snyder became a member of the state legislature and by 1802 had been made Speaker of the State House of Representatives.
Snyder had always been a Federalist, the party founded by Alexander Hamilton. But by 1805, after a split with the governor over important legislation, he joined the Democratic-Republicans founded by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison.
In 1808 Snyder decided to run for governor. The Pennsylvania Germans, now the major ethnic group in the state, had long wanted one of their own in the governor’s chair. Snyder won by a majority of over 24,000 votes. He was re-elected again in 1811 and again in 1814.
According to one story, Snyder’s youngest child is supposed to have asked his mother after the 1808 election if they were all governors now. “No, just me and Pop,” she is supposed to have responded.
The two biggest events of Snyder’s nine years as governor were the moving of the capital from Lancaster to Harrisburg in 1812 and the War of 1812 with Britain. The first came about as a result of population growth in the western part of the state. Harrisburg was selected as more centrally located. Just before it left Lancaster, one of the legislature’s last acts was the creation of Lehigh County.
The War of 1812 was widely popular in Pennsylvania, despite the general failure to gain any land by invading Canada. In 1814 a British invasion force that burned Washington D.C. was stopped in Baltimore before it could get to Philadelphia. Most of the Pennsylvania militia’s casualties came from diseases like dysentery.
Still widely popular, Snyder returned to Selinsgrove in 1818 only to be overwhelmed by financial woes brought on by the Panic of 1819. Elected to the State Senate, he only served one session. On November 9, 1819 Simon Snyder, the man who gave Pennsylvania Thanksgiving, died of typhoid fever just five days after his 60th birthday.
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