On December 27, 1851, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints leader Brigham Young issued a proclamation unique to Utah:

I DO PROCLAIM Thursday the 1st day of January next, A DAY OF PRAISE AND THANKSGIVING … that all may cease their quarrels and starve the lawyers.

It was a practical, pious message, but it was also biting. While the celebration was not in November, this proclamation by Brigham Young was seen as Utah’s first official Thanksgiving. But the holiday didn’t look exactly like the Plymouth Rock version or come about for the same reasons. Families woke up before dawn, tended their animals, baked what they could during the winter months, sharing food and gratitude with one another.

In 1848, even before Young’s proclamation, settlers in the Salt Lake Valley celebrated what Apostle Parley P. Pratt called a “Feast of Thanksgiving.” Historical myths and legends say that crickets nearly wiped out the settlers’ crops, but a small miracle came in the form of gulls, who ate the swarm of crickets, saving the crops that remained. 

Under a makeshift shelter of poles and canvases, neighbors celebrated the gulls and shared their harvest (mostly beef, bread, butter, cheeses, and cakes), giving thanks for surviving in the harsh climate of the high Utah desert.  Elder John Taylor led prayers of gratitude, and Parley Pratt’s newly written Harvest Song rang through the desert air.

During much of the 19th century, Utahns saw gratitude as something to be lived rather than scheduled. Historian Mark Melville, with the Utah State Historical Society, explained that, “for much of the 19th century, they referred to Pioneer Day as the Mormon Thanksgiving, or they often compared it to Thanksgiving.”

Thanksgiving in the 20th Century

Beyond the earlier celebrations, Utahns in the early 20th century didn’t necessarily do things differently on Thanksgiving when compared to the rest of the country. “I don’t know if Utah has a unique element of Thanksgiving,” Melville said. “It was just part of the broader national celebrations.”

However, Utahns, as they do for everything, folded their own pioneer faith, survival, and culture into the holiday.

As Thanksgiving evolved in Utah, the holiday became less about hardship and more about helping. Utahns, who had long practiced community welfare and food sharing as part of their faith, found new ways to live out gratitude through service. During World War II, Japanese Americans living in Salt Lake City organized shipments of Utah-grown celery to the Topaz incarceration camp, hoping to bring a small comfort of home to those unjustly imprisoned there.

Celery may seem like an odd emblem of Thanksgiving, but it represented something more than garnish. In 1942, Utah’s Nippo newspaper reminded readers that Celery Week was “right in season with the Thanksgiving holiday.” 

Dixie Salad

If there’s one dish that belongs uniquely to Utah’s Thanksgiving table, it’s Dixie Salad, which is a bright, whipped-cream-and-pomegranate creation that blends faith, harvest, and southern Utah ingenuity.

In Washington County, Pomegranates grew well in the mild southern climate, ripening just in time for Thanksgiving. The result was a local classic that still graces tables today.

As food historian Carol A. Edison explained in This Is the Plate: Utah Food Traditions, “For many Washington County residents, Dixie Salad is a Thanksgiving fixture (which coincides with harvest time for pomegranates) and a favorite at most every church social, school function, and community get-together.”

The salad’s origins are said to trace back to early 20th-century St. George, possibly introduced by a home economics teacher or a local demonstrator who used whatever fruit she could find in the community’s cellars and storerooms. Over time, Dixie Salad became as much a symbol as a dish — one that embodies the sweetness of survival and the abundance of the desert harvest.

Recipes vary from family to family. Some add apples or grapes, others fold in dates, bananas, or pecans. Thanksgiving in Utah has always been less about the food and more about what gratitude and service means. From Brigham Young’s proclamation to the unique Dixie Salad, Thanksgiving in Utah is the same as most places, but with a bit of our own special flavor added in. 

Feature Image of Dixie Salad enhanced photo using AI