Thanksgiving was for ‘thanks’ and family, not Black Friday!
By PENNY FLETCHER
We used to look forward to what we referred to as Thanksgiving Weekend. Even with all the turkey, pumpkin pies and football, the key word was Thanksgiving.
Many times, the festivities (and the leftovers) lasted until Sunday when we began to clean up and wave goodbye to our visitors. It was a time to enjoy — and give thanks for — family, friends and blessings.
Shopping was the farthest thing from our minds.
I had four children, four stepchildren and have since raised a granddaughter from 7 months old to the age of 18. So, you know we had Christmas shopping to do. But the Thanksgiving weekend was never the time to do it; why, we were barely over the mad rush down the aisles seeking turkey, cranberry, desserts, relishes, special drinks and other things we valued as “Thanksgiving traditions.”
I remember the first time I heard the term “Black Friday” associated with the day after Thanksgiving. I immediately had an aversion to it. Why, already the chains were bringing Christmas items in with the Halloween trucks, which to me seemed a definite effort to skip over Thanksgiving altogether and keep the money out of grocery stores and buy Christmas gifts on Thanksgiving weekend instead.
Now I know the term “Black Friday” existed long before we here in South County first heard it.
I know many merchants count on this day to “get back in the black” if they are running at a loss; Therefore, Black Friday. But I have since found out the term goes back farther than that, and depending upon which state you grew up in, you may even have heard it (used as it is now) long before we did here in the mid-1980s.
I looked up several myths and did find some truth in two of them.
The first recorded use of the term “Black Friday” was applied not to holiday shopping but to a financial crisis: The crash of the U.S. gold market on Sept. 24, 1869. Two notoriously ruthless Wall Street financiers had worked together to buy up as much as they could of the nation’s gold, hoping to drive the price sky-high and sell it for astonishing profits. On that Friday in September, the conspiracy finally unraveled, sending the stock market plunging, bankrupting everyone from Wall Street traders to farmers.
A later story that seems to hold some truth is that back in the 1950s, police in the city of Philadelphia used the term to describe the chaos that ensued on the day after Thanksgiving, when hordes of suburban shoppers and tourists flooded into the city in advance of the big Army-Navy football game held on that Saturday every year. Not only would Philly cops not be able to take the day off, but they would have to work extra-long shifts dealing with the additional crowds and traffic. Shoplifters would also take advantage of the bedlam in stores to make off with merchandise, adding to the law enforcement headache; thus, the police dubbed it Black Friday.
Discounting four other things I found on the Internet that are not worth mentioning in this space, I must say I thoroughly disapprove of what Black Friday means today.
Oh, if small businesses regain their footing on that day, more power to them (and then they have more reason than ever to continue Thanksgiving for the rest of the long weekend!).
I’m referring to the people who seem to think the more they spend the more they save and often open their wallets to “deals” that are not on their lists simply because those things are marked down.
What this amounts to is, if you have a list, and what is on it is half price, you are saving. But if you’re out spending on things just because they’re marked down — and often fighting other people to get the last one on the shelves — what has this day really become?
How much do those who camp out overnight — or even longer — in front of a store really give up of their weekend, and how much is that time worth?
I saved a lot of money the day after Thanksgiving (which I still refuse to call Black Friday).
You know how?
Except for saying “thanks” and seeing some friends and family, I stayed home.