It is a tradition that started well over 100 years ago. Before the Detroit Lions were a franchise. Before the NFL. Before professional football.
It all started in a little town called Ironton, Ohio.
No one knows when it exactly started. As the records back then wernt kept officially.
But there were two semi professional football teams in Ironton back as far as 1890. Basically a bunch of regular people that played football on the weekends for fun. Like a beer league.
And every year on thanksgiving, They would play a game against each other. And afterwards all come together and have dinner.
Later when the Ohio Professional Football League (the precursor to the NFL) was formed in the early 1900s. Ironton combined their teams to make the Ironton Tanks. They were an unofficial member of the league.
Once the NFL was formed, the nearby city of Portsmouth got approval to host a new team. Many of the Tanks players joined the team.
Shortly after the team was moved to Detroit. The players wanted to continue the Thanksgiving tradition. And beeing that the Detroit Lions owner was an NBC affiliate owner, he was able to get the Lions Thanksgiving day game on NBC nationally televised. And it has been played nationally ever since.