Posted on 12/26/2016 11:31:54 AM PST by Lorianne
As the U.S. gears up to mark the 400th anniversary of its roots as a nation, leading scholars from around the globe are teaming up to dispel myths and challenge long-held assumptions about how the country was settled.
Their group, New England Beginnings, is using phone apps and searchable online archives to help set the record straight about the early 1600s — and fill in some important knowledge gaps.
"All many people know is that the Pilgrims landed in Plymouth in 1620, Boston was started in 1630, and then in 1776 we had a revolution," said Rose Doherty, president of the Partnership of Historic Bostons, a group devoted to the 17th-century history of the city and the much-older Boston in Lincolnshire on the east coast of England.
Doherty's organization is among 19 prominent groups that comprise New England Beginnings. Others include the American Antiquarian Society, the General Society of Mayflower Descendants, the New England Historic Genealogical Society, Rhode Island's Tomaquag Museum, Britain's History of Independence Project and the Leiden American Pilgrim Museum in the Netherlands.
Together, they see an opening as the U.S. prepares in 2020 to mark the 400th anniversary of the Pilgrims' arrival in 1620.
"There's a lot of attention being paid right now to how you distinguish between real news and fake news. But this is something historians grapple with all the time," said Francis Bremer, a professor emeritus of history at Pennsylvania's Millersville University and the coordinator of New England Beginnings.
A key focus, Bremer said, is presenting a much more complete and accurate picture of how the early settlers interacted with Native Americans.
Underscoring the gulf between how natives and white Americans see history, on every Thanksgiving since 1970, members of New England tribes have gathered in downtown Plymouth for a solemn National Day of Mourning observance that recalls the disease, racism and oppression the settlers brought.
"It's an important part of the story that's really taken a back seat for a long time. You just can't bury history," said Paula Peters, a writer and activist and a member of Massachusetts' Wampanoag tribe. "People don't know how quickly it became repressive for the Wampanoags. Ship after ship after ship arrived, and they came with laws and deeds. You really have to put yourself in the moccasins of the people who were enduring that."
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Even today Mexico is a bloodthirsty shit-hole.
The small pox epidemic in North America preceded the pilgrims but about 100 years.
The early explorers noticed the Indians on the East coast took the hair and scalps of their victims as war trophies.
Digs have found skulls with scalping scars as far back as the 1100 AD on the High Plains.
Then there was that proof of cannibalism in the South West that the Indians refused to accept, so they blamed it on a roving band of Aztecs invading the area.
Many years ago OETA Oklahoma Educational TV had a program on how movies perceived the American Indian. IMAGES OF INDIANS. In it, one of the hosts claimed Indians NEVER scalped or tortured people. Later digs proved him wrong, wrong very wrong!
***did a masterful job in removing from the shelves of libraries and of schools the books that contained the early histories.***
Books everyone needs to read on the Indian wars...
MASSACRES OF THE MOUNTAINS by J Dunn Jr.
ON THE BORDER WITH CROOK by Burke
THE INDIAN WAR OF 1864 by Lt Ware
MY LIFE ON THE PLAINS by Custer
THE ROMANCE AND TRAGEDY OF PIONEER LIFE by AUGUSTUS LYNCH MASON
TOUGH TRIP THROUGH PARADISE by Andrew Garcia
and any book written by mountain men who lived with the Indians such as Osbourne Russell and John Y Nelson.
Everything you said is spot on. I’ve been a student of anthropology, especially of the American Indians, for 50 years, plus I’ve lived among them, and their predecessors’ ruins, going back even before that.
There there was more than one smallpox epidemic that swept the New World ... and they affected Europeans as well.
More Europeans survived smallpox than did natives but that was because many had already been exposed to it (and survived) in previous epidemics.
Salem, MA was NOT the first ‘witch’ trial in the Colonies.
Alse (Alice) Young, of Windsor, CT, was hanged in 1640.
All ‘peoples’ killed. That is the nature of it regardless of location.
I agree. I wish I knew how best to fight against it.
It’s illogical emotional claptrap.
Yes, a ton of bad stuff (by today’s standards) happened in the past. It is part of history and integral to how we got to where we are today. People 200 years from now will be judging us as backwards (or worse) by their standards. But we are just another part of history.
Thank you! I get very tired also of the Indians being portrayed as some kind of girl scout group, loving nature and keeping the earth clean until white man came along and spoiled everything.
When the Catholic Church determines a person for sainthood they have to study and document every detail of their life. Hence reading Saint biographies is a great way to get your hands on an authentic history book. It will tell you the traditions, cultural habits and lifestyle of the people the saints were involved with at that period of history. For a real intimate look at the lifestyle of Native American Indians try picking up a biography of Saint Isaac Jogues who was martyred by the Indians. They pulled his skin off inch by inch over a slow period of time These facts are documented years ago as his case for sainthood was being determined. An eye-opening look at history and putting things in their proper perspective. Kind of changes the idea that the left tries to portray them as a bunch of peace-loving nature-loving people who sat around a camp fire singing Kumbaya.
I’m tired of the meme from the left that white people stole the land from the Indians. Scientific evidence has determined at the American Indian shares the DNA of the Chinese and Mongolian race so it looks like somebody came across the borders and you might call them immigrants or squatters, but not the original land owners with a deed to America!
One of the most prevalent misconceptions is that the pilgrims were puritans. The pilgrims were seperationists who ran from the Church of England, while the puritans tried to ‘purify’ the church of catholic practices from within.
And enslavement of their enemies, ritualistic sacrifice, etc
“Injuns!!!!”
Supposedly much disease had already run through the local Indians which made the area less populated and therefore caused less friction with the Plymouth Settlers.
My direct ancestor George Ricker (Ricart) and his brother Maturin were killed in 1706 by Natives.
https://www.accessgenealogy.com/genealogy/descendants-george-maturin-ricker.htm
The Yankees distort history too as Jamestown was the first permanent English settlement in spite of the Powhatans.
http://historicjamestowne.org/history/history-of-jamestown/
Most of the people on the Mayflower had been attending the Leiden Church in Holland...(Reformed Dutch/Walloon/Huguenot)
there were also a few Huguenots amongst the Mayflower group..
The people at the Leiden church knew some of the passengers on the New Netherland, the ship that went to NYC in 1623/24..
That’s partly where Jesse de Forest got his idea to go to Virginia..apply to the English ambassador for permission...however after getting turned down they went to the new Dutch Colony of “New Netherland” (named for that 1st ship)
I had ancestors on that ship too...Phillip du Trieux..
I hope they cover the massive amount of assimilation of most Native Americans into the main society. They converted to Chritianity. They intermarried with Christians.
This came in several waves. One wave was fur traders who started in Western NY and PA. As those areas were settled, the fur traders moved ever westward. Those fur traders were extremely friendly with the Indians. They intermarried with the Indians. They were Christian without being aggressive missionaries.
Then there were the missionaries, both Catholic and Protestant. There were many other types of people in those early days.
Alexis DeTouqueville best described the result of those early years that produced the American Experiment.
Henry Hudson and the Halve Moon in 1607...he got all the way to Albany...
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