Conversations in Management
Franklin
was writing about the wild turkey which was, at the time, a hot
contender for national bird. Apparently the ink was barely dry
on the Declaration of Independence when the First Continental
Congress appointed a committee to design the nation’s first
Great Seal. It fell to Franklin, Adams and Jefferson to select a
symbol that best represented the new American spirit. Adams
promoted the Bald Eagle (which Franklin considered an immoral
bird) while Franklin advocated for the turkey. The congressional
debate was vigorous and in the end, the turkey lost by only
one vote.
Actually,
the turkey had much to commend it as a national symbol. For one
thing, it was quick. It could fly at speeds up to 55 mph and
could run between 15 and 30 mph. It was also cunning and
feisty—without being aggressive. More importantly, it was truly
an American original. Indigenous to North and Central America,
it was one of the first animals encountered by Christopher
Columbus. Legend has it that Columbus, believing he was in the
Indies, identified the unsuspecting fowl as a tuka—the
Tamil word for peacock. Unfortunately, legend doesn’t explain
where Columbus picked up this Tamil vocabulary or why he didn’t
apply Tamil names to anything else he noted. None-the-less, by
1520 domesticated turkeys were common throughout Europe, though
no one associated them with the New World. When the pilgrims
(AKA Separatists) arrived on Cape Cod they were astonished to
discover wild turkeys just like the domesticated ones they’d
brought from home. In celebration, they promptly stuffed and
roasted a few for a kind of impromptu Thanksgiving dinner. They
evidently missed the irony that in less than a hundred years,
the turkey had both emigrated from and immigrated to
the New World. Talk about globe trotting!
Though
turkeys were both quick and well traveled, they weren’t
particularly bright and over time that diminished their
prestige. Former mayor of San Antonio Maury Maverick Sr. didn’t
help things any when he used the poor turkey as a poster-bird
for his anti-jargon campaign. While serving in the Roosevelt
administration during World War II, he issued a memo forbidding
gobbledygook language, and added “anyone using the words
‘activation’ or ‘implementation’ will be shot.” He later
explained, “Turkeys are always gobbledy gobbling and strutting
with ludicrous pomposity. At the end of his gobble, there was a
sort of gook.” Maverick had hoped to eliminate phrases such as
“maladjustments co-extensive with the problem areas,” and
“alternative but nevertheless meaningful minimae.” (While he
succeeded in coining a new word—gobbledygook—he was less
successful in stamping out Fed-speak.) But the low point came in
the 50’s when turkey became slang for someone who—like
the bird—was too stupid to come in out of the rain. The rest, as
they say, is giblet gravy.
The noble
turkey’s migration from the Great Seal to grandma’s
platter is a journey vaguely familiar to us all. We have to
admit that to some extent we’re all a little vain and a
little silly. We know that some times we’re quick and
cunning while at others we’re mired in gobbledygook. Some days
we fly, some days we’re roasted. The good news is that
there’s always something to be thankful for and we don’t have to
look too far to find it. There’s goodness and grace all around
us. There’s happiness in things great and small. And at the end
of the day, we know that we really are Birds of Courage!
Happy Thanksgiving!
—Ebert
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