Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of I Heart Radio. Hey
Speaker 1: brain Stuff Lauren voglebam here. It might come in fourth
Speaker 1: on the list of America's top protein choices, but one
Speaker 1: day out of the year, nothing else will do. Every
Speaker 1: Thanksgiving Day, chicken, beef, and pork all step aside and
Speaker 1: make room for their poultry compadre, the turkey. For turkeys, however,
Speaker 1: Thanksgiving isn't such a blessing. It's estimated that in seventeen
Speaker 1: a whopping forty five million turkeys were consumed for the occasion,
Speaker 1: some suffering the fate of being stuffed not only with
Speaker 1: stuffing but also with a duck and chicken to create
Speaker 1: that poultry profusion called the Urduccan that we discussed a
Speaker 1: couple episodes ago. There are a couple competing origin stories
Speaker 1: for the Thanksgiving feast, including a couple of meals shared
Speaker 1: between Native Americans and European colonists stretching back to the
Speaker 1: sixteen hundreds, but it wasn't an official American holiday until
Speaker 1: President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed November eighteen sixty three a National
Speaker 1: day of Giving thanks. Before that, Thanksgivings days spent in prayer,
Speaker 1: thanking God for some fortuitous event or another were periodically
Speaker 1: celebrated by New England colonists, but not anything like the
Speaker 1: level of the national Thanksgiving festivities we see today. Presidents
Speaker 1: following Lincoln annually proclaimed the holiday the last Thursday in November,
Speaker 1: until when Franklin D. Roosevelt switched it to the fourth
Speaker 1: Thursday in November, not necessarily the last, in an attempt
Speaker 1: to kick off the holiday shopping season a touch earlier.
Speaker 1: But turkey didn't immediately join the Thanksgiving scene as the
Speaker 1: staple centerpiece, and interestingly enough, the turkeys that you see
Speaker 1: in the grocery store today don't really resemble the birds
Speaker 1: that Pilgrims and Native Americans may or may not have
Speaker 1: actually feasted on. Turkeys were eaten by both peoples, but
Speaker 1: had always been bred primarily for their striking, dark colored feathers.
Speaker 1: That plumage creates tiny pinpricks of pigment in the flesh
Speaker 1: that turned off many consumers. Because of this and debates
Speaker 1: about which size was most appropriate for both private and
Speaker 1: commercial usage, a breeding campaign was conducted in the United
Speaker 1: States during the first half of the twentieth century in
Speaker 1: search of a better selling bird. The modern result is
Speaker 1: the broad breasted white turkey. These turkeys are specters of
Speaker 1: their ancestors. They've been bred to be colorless, larger, and
Speaker 1: have bigger breasts. Whether you roasted, smoke it, grill it,
Speaker 1: or deep fri it, turkey has really wedged itself a
Speaker 1: spot on Thanksgiving Day dinner table. Some eighty eight percent
Speaker 1: of American families eat turkey on Thanksgiving Day. Back in
Speaker 1: ninety nine, Americans only eight about eighteen million turkeys annually.
Speaker 1: By nineteen seventy, that number was approximately a hundred and
Speaker 1: sixteen million. In seventeen, the number of turkeys raised in
Speaker 1: the United States was about two hundred and forty five million,
Speaker 1: and that wasn't even a peak year. In nineteen six,
Speaker 1: US growers produced a record three hundred and three million turkeys.
Speaker 1: But that doesn't seem to be because more people have
Speaker 1: been eating turkeys at Thanksgiving. That forty million number mentioned
Speaker 1: at the top of the episode has been holding pretty steady.
Speaker 1: Back in nine seventy, about fifty of the turkey consumed
Speaker 1: the United States was eaten around the holidays. Over the years,
Speaker 1: that number has dropped to about meaning people are eating
Speaker 1: it throughout the year. We know this because overall turkey
Speaker 1: consumption has about doubled in that same time period. In
Speaker 1: seventy Americans chowed down on an average of eight pounds
Speaker 1: a little more than three and a half kilos of
Speaker 1: turkey per person per year. That number has now climbed
Speaker 1: to about eighteen pounds. Perhaps all those turkey burgers are
Speaker 1: the reason turkey is a year round fixture on many
Speaker 1: menus today, and although Thanksgiving is still big business in
Speaker 1: the industry, turkey would probably retain its popularity even if
Speaker 1: something else like lamb tried to muscle its way into
Speaker 1: that special all holiday celebration. Today's episode was written by
Speaker 1: Jessica Toothman and produced by Tyler Clay. Brain Stuff is
Speaker 1: a production of I Heeart Radios How Stuff Works. For
Speaker 1: more in the history of turkeys and Thanksgiving, check out
Speaker 1: my other show Savored It's a Wild Ride, and for
Speaker 1: more on this and lots of other topics that aren't
Speaker 1: just talking turkey, visit our home planet how Stuffworks dot com.
Speaker 1: Plus for more podcasts from my Heart Radio, you can
Speaker 1: visit my Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
Speaker 1: listen to your favorite shows.