National Geographic
Thanksgiving 2013: What to Know About Turkey Day
Get the lowdown on holiday history, travel, football, feasting, and more.
By Brian Handwerk

Thanksgiving is almost upon us—but how much do you know about America's favorite day to eat turkey?

Here's the lowdown on Thanksgiving history, holiday travel, football, feasting, and more.

Thanksgiving Dinner: Recipe for Food Coma?

Key to any Thanksgiving Day menu are a fat turkey and cranberry sauce.

An estimated 254 million turkeys were raised for slaughter in the U.S. during 2012, up 2 percent from 2011's total, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Agricultural Statistics Service.

About 46 million of those turkeys ended up on U.S. dinner tables last Thanksgiving—or about 736 million pounds (334 million kilograms) of turkey meat, according to estimates from the National Turkey Federation.

Minnesota is the United States' top turkey-producing state, followed by North Carolina, Arkansas, Missouri, Virginia, Indiana, and California. These "big seven" states produce more than two of every three U.S.-raised birds, according to U.S. Census Bureau data.

U.S. farmers also produced an estimated 768 million pounds (348 million kilograms) of cranberries in 2012, which, like turkeys, are native to the Americas. The top producers are Wisconsin and Massachusetts.

The U.S. grew 2.6 billion pounds (1.18 billion kilograms) of sweet potatoes—many in North Carolina, Mississippi, California, and Louisiana—and produced more than 1.2 billion pounds (544 million kilograms) of pumpkins. Illinois, California, Pennsylvania, and Ohio grow the most U.S. pumpkins...

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