The use of Black Friday as a descriptor for the day after Thanksgiving has nothing to do with the selling of slaves, though, and the term didnt originate until nearly a century after the practice of slavery was abolished in the U.S. The earliest known use of Black Friday in such a context stems from 1951 and referred to the practice of workers calling in sick on the day after Thanksgiving in order to have four consecutive days off (because that day was not yet commonly offered as a paid day off by employers). By 1961 the term Black Friday (and Black Saturday as well) was being commonly used in a derisive sense by Philadelphia police, who had to deal with the mayhem and headaches caused by all the extra pedestrian and vehicular traffic created by hordes of shoppers heading for the citys downtown stores on the two days after Thanksgiving. #slaverynah
Posted on: Fri, 28 Nov 2014 12:21:38 +0000
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