ONE TOUGH TURKEY: A Thanksgiving Story

If the Vegetarian Society were to commission a would-be TV cartoonist to revise the first Thanksgiving story, this might be the result. According to Kroll, the Pilgrims really had lots of squash for their first Thanksgiving dinner. Everyone just thinks they had turkey--because everyone doesn't know about Solomon, the smart turkey who saved his flock from the muskets. A silly-looking bird in checkered vest and red moccasins, Solomon first puts up a sign saying that the turkeys have flown south for the winter. When that fails he and his family stretch a rope between trees to trip the hunters. Then he places himself and the others behind different trees to scatter and confuse the hunters. The turkeys bury the men in feathers dropped from treetops, and finally, running off, lead the hunters into a briar patch. The pictures are as obvious as the ploys, the lines never wittier than ""We haven't come all the way from England to be treated like this by a bunch of turkeys!"" For a hang-together story and a turkey trick with inherent humor, see Brian Schatell's Farmer Golf and His Turkey Sam (p. 272, J-60).