An Iowa farmer is raising the ?Presidential Flock? for this year?s National Thanksgiving Turkey Presentation.
Ron Kardel serves as chairman of the National Turkey Federation and farms in Scott County. He recently told the Iowa Agriculture Literacy Foundation that he has the thrill this year of raising the flock for the President of the United States.
?Every year for the past 73 years, the White House has issued an invitation for turkeys to attend a ceremony in the White House,? Kardel said. ?It?s kind of the unofficial start of the holiday season. This year, we have the honor of raising them because I?m currently the chairman of the National Turkey Federation. That?s been the tradition in the past is the chairman?s state, or the chairman themselves, raise the turkeys.?
White House officials say the ?Presidential Flock? is raised much in the same way as turkeys marketed for U.S. customers?protected from weather extremes and predators in a barn, free to strut about with constant access to water and a feed mix of corn and soybeans.
?These turkeys will leave here the week of Thanksgiving,? Kardel said. ?They will travel to Washington, D.C. in a van. They will get red carpet treatment going up into The Willard Hotel, which is about a block from the White House. They get a room all to themselves. Then, they will get presented at the White House to the President of the United States. The ceremony ? weather permitting ? is in the Rose Garden.?
The National Thanksgiving Turkey Presentation first took place in 1947 under President Harry S. Truman. In 1987, President Ronald Reagan was the first president on record to issue a pardon to his turkey. The last time Iowa raised turkeys were selected for the ceremony was in 2016 during Barack Obama?s presidency.
