Thanksgiving Football, An American Tradition

For many, watching football is as much a part of an American Thanksgiving as turkey and pumpkin pie. Every year, football fans gather around the TV to watch the annual NFL games — last year, a record 37.5 million viewers watched the Detroit Lions defeat the Chicago Bears.

Football on Thanksgiving is an American tradition almost as old as the holiday itself. It dates back to 1876, when the Intercollegiate Football Association (IFA) began scheduling its championship game on Thanksgiving Day — just 13 years after Abraham Lincoln first proclaimed the last Thursday in November a national holiday. By holding the event on a holiday when people were off work, the thinking went, the game would draw larger crowds, increase the popularity of the sport, and more important firmly link football to the popular holiday.

The strategy worked.

That first championship game, on November 30, 1876, was between Yale and Princeton; fewer than 1,000 attended. Less than five years later, the Yale-Princeton game in New York City drew 10,000 fans. In 1893, more than 40,000 attended the match. The impact of Thanksgiving football was felt across the nation. By the late 1890s, colleges and high schools across the country started Thanksgiving games — and the connection stuck.

For over a century, Post artists have captured tackles and touchdowns, cheers and jeers, huddles and home teams — both the game play and its spirit. We hope you enjoy.

  
This article is featured in the November/December 2025 issue of The Saturday Evening Post. Subscribe to the magazine for more art, inspiring stories, fiction, humor, and features from our archives.