Melanie Kirkpatrick discusses her new book, “Thanksgiving: the Holiday at the Heart of the American Experience.” She shares stories from the holiday’s history, including “the godmother of Thanksgiving,” and the Thanksgiving debate that occurred during President George Washington’s term in office.

Melanie Kirkpatrick is a writer based in Connecticut and a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington, D.C. She contributes reviews and commentary to various publications, including the opinion pages of The Wall Street Journal, for which she worked for many years. At the Journal, she was a longtime member of the editorial board and a deputy editor of the editorial page. She is a director of the America for Bulgaria Foundation, a trustee of Princeton in Asia, and a member of the advisory board of the Human Freedom program of the George W. Bush Institute. She holds an A.B. from Princeton and an M.A. from the University of Toronto. She is the author of Escape from North Korea: The Untold Story of Asia’s Underground Railroad (Encounter Books, 2012) and Thanksgiving: The Holiday at the Heart of the American Experience.

Her remarks were recorded at the Conservative Women’s Network luncheon, co-sponsored by CBLPI and the Heritage Foundation, on November 18, 2016.

Note: We apologize for the technical difficulties that caused her closing remarks (in response to an audience question) to be lost.