"Thanksgiving kicks off the holiday season, when stress can sometimes drown the cheer. If you fear your holiday gathering may run afoul, take consolation in Denver's first Thanksgiving.

As was the case in Massachusetts, Native Americans provided the setting but were not well repaid for their hospitality. The head chief of the Southern Arapaho, Little Raven, welcomed the first Gold Rush miners to share his tribe's winter camp at the confluence of Cherry Creek and the South Platte River. The Arapaho knew that the climate was milder at the base of the mountains. The South Platte and Cherry Creek usually flowed all winter, and the cottonwood trees provided shelter and fuel and the prairie grass dried into hay for their horse herds.

Although these resources were limited, Chief Little Raven and his tribe shared them with the pale-faces, not realizing that 100,000 of them would show up in the next few years."

Get the Story:
Tom Noel: Denver's first Thanksgiving (The Denver Post 11/14)