New York, NY (WFN) -- If you think Thanksgiving is an American invention, you're the real turkey.

According to food journalist Burt Wolf, humans have been celebrating Thanksgiving holidays for more than 8000 years. However, the events were usually one-time occasions inspired by, say, a tremendous victory, and forgotten thereafter.

The pilgrims did have two fall festivals during the early years of Plymouth Rock, but it wasn't until Abraham Lincoln's presidency that the idea of an annual "Thanksgiving" holiday finally took root.

Wolf claims Lincoln tried to use the holiday to keep the Union together and even made a big deal out of a dish featuring sweet potatoes and maple syrup because, as Wolf puts it, "the potatoes were from the south and the syrup was from the north."

Wolf dishes more about Thanksgiving in "Taste Of Freedom," a documentary special about the holiday airing this week on public broadcasting stations.

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