Black Friday: A look back at one of America’s most chaotic holiday traditions

By Johnny SimonNovember 24, 2016

After the Thanksgiving turkey is cleared from tables across the US, millions of shoppers will line up at malls and big box stores like Walmart, Target, and Best Buy for the pre-dawn shopping bacchanal known as Black Friday.

It’s long been thought of as the “biggest shopping day of the year,” but its importance may be waning as consumers choose to stay home and shop online, and retailers are offering deals spread around the holiday season, sometimes even before Thanksgiving. Nevertheless, for many it’s still an event worth fighting turmoil and anarchy for.

If these chaotic scenes might be a bit too much to handle on a full stomach, perhaps you should just go for a walk.