Blessing listed as top Thanksgiving tradition

Aiken Hounds Master of Fox Hounds Linda Knox McLean and Father Garrett Clanton of All Saints Anglican Church participate in the Blessing of the Hounds. Staff photo by Ben Baugh.

The Blessing of the Hounds made The Huffington Post's 10 Terrific Thanksgiving Traditions list.

The Aiken Thanksgiving tradition, which attracted about 350 people this year, is No. 7 on the Internet newspaper's list, joined by Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and Houston's Uptown Holiday Lighting, to name a few other events included in the line-up.

Kate Auletta, travel editor with The Huffington Post, wrote in an e-mail, "We do a bunch of research before we publish slideshows. In this particular case, it required a lot of Web-browsing and asking friends around the country what their traditions are - and readers certainly wrote in with their favorite traditions, too."

Thanksgiving marked the 96th year Aiken Hounds has observed the ceremony at Memorial Gate in Hitchcock Woods.

Master of Hounds Linda Knox McLean said she is not sure why the blessing is held annually on Thanksgiving Day. No matter the why of it; the tradition is firmly fixed in the history of Aiken and its equestrian heritage, she said.

When they traveled here from up north, Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Hitchcock bought 5,000 acres of long-leaf pine wooded farmland in Aiken on which to train their steeplechase horses. About 3,000 of those acres are what is now Hitchcock Woods, one of the largest urban forests in the nation, which will be preserved in perpetuity, thanks to a conservation easement.

"The fences were enormous in those days - upwards of 5 feet," Knox McLean said. "The Hitchcocks thought, 'Wouldn't it be fun to introduce hounds into the mix?'"

The Blessing of the Hounds is part of the Aiken Hounds' Opening Meet and officially kicks off the hunt season.

The hunt immediately following the blessing is a drag hunt. A cloth saturated in fox urine is dragged through the Woods in a pre-set route. The hounds follow the scent in an artificial chase and mounted riders follow the pack.

"It's the chase in mind; not the kill," Knox McLean.

The Aiken Hounds are the oldest recognized drag hunt, according to the Masters of Foxhounds Association of North America.

The blessing, this year offered by Father Garrett Clanton of All Saints Anglican Church, calls upon God to bless all aspects of the hunt.

"Basically to bless how fortunate we are to be in such a beautiful place, the horses we ride and the hounds whose company we enjoy," Knox McLean said. "It is very social. The blessing is a very old, sacred event."

The prayer, in part, reads, "O God ... pour down thy mercy on these thy servants, their horses and their hounds; to all who shall take part in this hunt, grant protection of body and soul; make us all ever mindful of, and responsive to, the needs of others that the spirit of true sportsmanship may prevail in all that we do."

The hounds used are indeed fox hounds. George Washington is the father of the American Foxhound - he ran a breeding program and often referenced his hounds in his journals, according to the American Kennel Club.

To view the complete list, visit The Huffington Post.

The Complete List

1. Turkey Trot, nationwide

2. Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, New York

3. Plimoth Plantation, Plymouth, Mass. (The site of the first Thanksgiving in 1621)

4. Philadelphia's Thanksgiving Day Parade

5. Jamestown Settlement Food & Feasts of Colonial Virginia

6. Volunteering, nationwide

7. Blessing of the Hounds, Aiken, S.C.

8. Wine Country Thanksgiving, Willamette Valley, Ore.

9. Hollywood Christmas Parade, Los Angeles

10. Uptown Holiday Lighting, Houston, Texas