Regarding Thanksgiving customs, going around the table saying what we’re thankful for is about as basic as it gets. If it seems too basic, this year you can consider adding a new dimension to the tradition by reading for the table what our Presidents have been thankful for.

Thanks to the Pilgrim Hall Museum in Massachusetts, all the Thanksgiving Proclamations are available online. That means we have access to Proclamations dating from the Continental Congress (before there were Presidents), to when George Washington issued the first Presidential Proclamation in 1789, all the way to Bush's from two weeks ago.

In fact, there was only one large dark period, when no President issued a Proclamation from 1816-1863, so most of the country’s history is represented. It’s more than worthwhile to go through the eras and pick your favorite President or decade to see what each President felt particularly grateful for at the time.

Contemporary events really shaped the Proclamations: during the Civil War, Lincoln ended the Proclamation hiatus by proclaiming a “day of thanksgiving” in order, he said, to recognize God who remained merciful despite “national perverseness and disobedience”; during the two World Wars, Wilson and FDR praised the troops for “the promise of enduring peace”; and even during the great depression, Hoover found it possible to be thankful, pointing out that “the measure of passing adversity which has come upon us should deepen the spiritual life of the people.”

The gushing optimism of the Proclamations is almost impossible to shrug away, and it’s made even more impressive considering it’s expressed by some of this country’s greatest orators. Try reading one or two at the table, maybe they’ll become a new part of your Thanksgiving tradition.