Turkey pardon: Biden pardons turkeys for final time as US President
The strange tradition of presidential turkey pardonspublished at 15:29 Greenwich Mean Time
Image source, Abbie Rowe, White House Photographs / John F. Kennedy Presidential LibraryPresident John F Kennedy pardons a turkey in front of the White House
Turkey pardons can be traced back to President Abraham Lincoln in 1863.
Historians claim he spared a turkey’s life after his son, Tad, befriended it.
But yearly pardoning became an “official” tradition under George H W Bush, when the former president pardoned a turkey in 1989 as animal-rights activists protested nearby.
“‘Reprieve,’ ‘keep him going’, or ‘pardon’: it’s all the same for the turkey, as long as he doesn’t end up on the president’s holiday table,” he said.
Other presidents before Bush Snr did spare birds lives, including President John F Kennedy – who gave an unofficial pardoning days before his assassination in 1963.
Many people believe the custom was started by Harry Truman in 1947, because he was the first president to receive a turkey on behalf of the poultry industry.
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