The First American Child Born of European Ancestry -- Different Paths To the Truth

 

So who were the people who really deserve to be called the first Americans? Michael Bawaya, the editor of the magazine American Archaeology said that they came here from Asia probably "no later than about 15,000 years ago." They walked across the Bering land bridge that back in the day connected what is now the U.S. state of Alaska and Siberia. Fifteen-thousand years ago, ocean levels were much lower and the land between the continents was hundreds of kilometers wide.

(Kevin Enochs. “The Real Story: Who Discovered America”? Voice of America. October 12, 2020.)

Kevin Enochs of VOA says …

“But there's more. Today, it's widely believed that before the Clovis people, there were others, and as Bawaya says, "they haven't really been identified." But there are remants of them in places as far-flung as the U.S. states of Texas and Virginia, and as far south as Peru and Chile. We call them, for lack of a better name, the Pre-Clovis people.

“And to make things more complicated, recent discoveries are threatening to push back the arrival of humans in North America even further back in time. Perhaps as far back as 20,000 years or more. But the science on this is far from settled.”

Another population who probably visited America way before Columbus are the Polynesians. The main clue for this behavior is the inconspicuous sweet potato (yam).

This humble pinkish-red tuber is native to South America. And yet, there have been sweet potatoes on the menu in Polynesia as far back as 1,000 years ago. So how did it get there?

By comparing the DNA of Polynesian and South American sweet potatoes, scientists think it's clear that someone either brought them back to Polynesia after visiting South America, or islanders brought them from South America when they were exploring the Pacific Ocean. Either way, it suggests that about the same time Nordic sailors were cutting trees in Canada, someone in Polynesia was trying sweet potatoes from South America for the first time.

Speaking of genetics, a 2014 study of the DNA of natives on the Polynesian island of Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island, found a fair amount of Native American genes in the mix. The entry of American DNA into the genetics of the Rapa Nui natives suggests that the two peoples were living together around 1280 AD.

It seems very likely that Polynesians did reach America and established some kind of trade route. If this happened, it was before Columbus’ time, but it’s not clear if it was before the Vikings.

(Mihai Andrei. “Who really discovered America? (Spoiler: it’s not Columbus).” ZME Science. October 14, 2019.)

History is not just what-really-happened-in-the-past, but a complex intersection of truths, bias and hopes. Professional historians know that the reality of history is hardly so unproblematical. But because the answers are hard to come by doesn't mean we should give up pursuing historical truth, only that we must approach it with realistic expectations of what history can deliver.

“And even if a recording provided every essential fact, it would still leave open matters of motivation, such as why these things happened and why later ages did not preserve the full truth. The tape would, no doubt, fan the flames of controversy more than stifling them, and the result would only be more smoke and greater historical asthma. After the circus surrounding the speculations about President Kennedy's assassination—even when a film of it exists!—who can deny some people's capacity to question what's standing right in front of them?”

– Mark Damon, “History and What-Really-Happened”

But, Who Was the First American Born of European Ancestry?

The birth of the first white child is a widely used concept to mark the establishment of a European colony in the New World, especially in the historiography of the United States. Historiography examines the secondary sources written by historians as books and articles, evaluates the primary sources they use, and provides a critical examination of the methodology of historical study.

Who was the first European child born in America? You say it doesn't matter? What if the inability of Americans to agree on our shared history – and on the right way to teach it – is a cause of our current polarization and political dysfunction, rather than a symptom?

Sam Wineburg, a professor of education and history at Stanford University, attempts to connect the dots between history education and citizenship. Wineburg says …

“If this polyglot country doesn’t have a set of ideals and a broad narrative, we don’t have much of a hope. It is not popular to talk about in an era of identity politics, but history teaching in school has a civic purpose, not only a disciplinary purpose.”

Virginia Dare, born on August 18, 1587, at Roanoke Island in what is now North Carolina was the first English child born in the New World. Many credit Dare with being the first European born in America. However, a large body of research disputes this claim … well, it's complicated for some obvious reasons.

For over four hundred years, Dare has become a prominent figure in American myth and folklore, symbolizing different things to different groups of people. She has been featured as a main character in books, poems, songs, comic books, television programs, and films. Her name has been used to sell different types of goods, from vanilla products to soft drinks, as well as wine and spirits. Many places in North Carolina and elsewhere in the Southern United States have been named in her honor.

Should our American history books include alternate stories of first settlement? Who were the first Europeans who crossed the Atlantic, disembarked on land unsettled by Europeans, found a suitable site, and began to build with the intention of staying, not merely exploring. Many scholars understand that traditional texts often define “American” as White and only as White. Anything that was less than an Anglo Saxon was not a true American.

Virginia Dare

The first voyage to Roanoke was in 1584. Explorers Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe were the first known Europeans to set eyes on the island. They had been sent to the area by Sir Walter Raleigh with the mission of scouting the broad sounds and estuaries in search of an ideal location for settlement.

The Roanoke Colonies were an ambitious attempt by England's Sir Walter Raleigh to establish a permanent North American settlement with the purpose of harassing Spanish shipping, mining for gold and silver, discovering a passage to the Pacific Ocean, and Christianizing the Indians.

The voyage was described by Arthur Barlowe – one of two British captains (the other was Philip Amadas) – in this report written to Sir Walter Raleigh …

“the first voyage made to the coasts of America, with two barks, wherein were Captains M. Philip Amadas and M. Arthur Barlowe, who discovered part of the countrey now called Virginia, anno 1584. Written by one of the said captaines, and sent to Sir Walter Ralegh, Knight, at whose charge and direction, the said voyage was set forth.”

The History of North Carolina confirms the following:

“Elenora, daughter to the governor of the city and wife to Ananias Dare, one of the assistants, was delivered of a daughter in Roanoke … and because this chld was the first Christian born in Virginia, she was named Virginia.”

(Francis Lister Hawks. History of North Carolina: Embracing the period between the first voyage to the colony in 1584, to the last in 1591. Largely reprinted from Hakluyt's Voyages.” 1859.)

Little is known of the lives of either of her parents. Her mother Eleanor was born in London around 1563, and was the daughter of John White, the governor of the ill-fated Roanoke Colony. Eleanor married Ananias Dare (born c. 1560), a London tiler and bricklayer, at St Bride's Church on Fleet Street in the City of London. He, too, was part of the Roanoke expedition. Virginia Dare was one of two infants born to the colonists in 1587 and the only female child born to the settlers.

(Lee Miller. Roanoke: Solving the Mystery of the Lost Colony. 2000.)

(Dewi Morgan. Phoenix of Fleet St – 2,000 years of St Bride's, Charles Knight & Co.1973)

Nothing else is known of Virginia Dare's life, as the Roanoke Colony did not endure.

John White, Virginia's grandfather and governor of the colony, sailed for England for fresh supplies at the end of 1587. He was unable to return to Roanoke until August 18, 1590 due to England's war with Spain and the pressing need for ships to defend against the Spanish Armada – by which time he found that the settlement had been long deserted. The buildings had collapsed and "the houses [were] taken down". Worse, White was unable to find any trace of his daughter or granddaughter, or indeed any of the 80 men, 17 women, and 11 children who made up the "Lost Colony".

(Giles Milton. Big Chief Elizabeth – How England's Adventurers Gambled and Won the New World, Hodder & Stoughton, London. 2000)

Snorri Thorfinnsson

Norway or Scandinavia – One must consider these were northern European countries. Did early Norse explorers actually venture into the present confines of the United States?

After all, an 11th century Norwegian coin – a Norse penny, made between 1065 and 1093 – was found in Maine in 1957, and it has been suggested as evidence of Pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact. And, on a hillside that overlooks Narragansett Bay in Newport, Rhode Island, sits a stone tower. Normally such a structure would not be so shrouded in mystery, but the discovery of a rune marker stone in 1946 on one of the legs of the tower has created debate for over seventy years.

The Dictionary of Canadian Biography claims Snorri Thorfinnsson was the first white child born on the North American continent. Archaeological evidence of the only known Norse site in North America (outside Greenland) was found at L'Anse aux Meadows on the northern tip of the island of Newfoundland. Before the discovery of archaeological evidence, Vinland was known only from the sagas and medieval historiography.

(Helge Ingstad, Helge; Anne Stine. The Viking Discovery of America: The Excavation of a Norse Settlement in L'Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland. 2001)

During their stay in North America. a son was born to Thorfinnr and Gudridr Thorfinnsson and given the name of Snorri.

There is speculation about the birth date of Snorri Thorfinnsson. Birth years such as 1005, 1009, and 1012 have been postulated, but all sources agree that he was born between 1005 and 1013.

(Magnus Magnusson and Hermann Pálsson, Hermann. The Vinland Sagas. 1965.)

The Saga of Eric the Red, supplemented by the Saga of the Greenlanders, is the main source of the few facts known about Snorri. His father, Thorfinnr, went from Iceland to Greenland. There he became interested in the new lands in North America to which the sons of Eirikr Thorvaldsson (Eric the Red) – Leifr heppni Eiriksson, Thorvaldr, and Thorsteinn – had made expeditions in the years following a.d. 1000.

According to the Vinland sagas, when Snorri was 3 years old, his family left Vinland because of hostilities with indigenous peoples (called Skrælingar by the settlers, meaning "barbarians"). His father was determined to lead a colonizing expedition and set sail with 60 men and 5 women (Saga of the Greenlanders), accompanied by two other ships, some time during the years 1003–10 (Saga of Eric the Red).

Where Thorfinnr established his colony is not known. Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and Massachusetts are among the many regions that have been suggested, although the likeliest spot is probably the vicinity of Cape Cod.

The colony lasted for three years, and during the summers exploratory voyages were undertaken both north and south. Many scholars believe that the explorers sailed a considerable distance up the St. Lawrence River, and, according to the Saga of Eric the Red, even reached the “land of the Unipeds”-- Unipeds are one-legged Norse mythical creatures.

The peace of the colony, however, was disturbed by troubles with the aborigines of the region, although there is no agreement among historians on whether these were First Nations or Inuit. Bloody fighting broke out. Whether because of this or for some other reason, the settlement was abandoned after three years and the settlers returned to Greenland and the Glaumbær farm in Seyluhreppur.

Thorfinnr later sailed to Norway and sold a boatload of goods from Vinland, which made him relatively rich.

Gudridr, described in the sagas as "the most attractive of women and one to be reckoned with in all her dealings", made one or more trips between Iceland and Greenland and eventually travelled to Rome to meet the pope. She became a nun and returned to Iceland, where she established a church.

"She was probably one of the most well-travelled women of the period - and all of it in an open boat," said historian Elisabeth Ward of the Smithsonian Institution's Museum of Natural History.

(“Archaeology team unlocks the saga of Snorri Thorfinnsson.” The Age. September 17, 2002.)

Thus, evidence shows that Snorri was taken to Iceland by his parents two years after the colony came to an end.

Snorri lived out his life there, but the date of his death is unknown. However, it is known that a “great and goodly lineage” sprang from him, including “several of the early bishops of Iceland.” He had two children; a daughter named Hallfrid, and a son named Thorgeir. Hallfrid was the mother of Thorlak Runolfsson, bishop of Skálholt in the south of Iceland. Thorgeir was the father of Yngvild who was the mother of Brand Sæmundarsson, bishop of Hólar.

(T. J. Oleson. Dictionary of Canadian Biography Volume I – 1000-1700.)

Martín de Argüelles, Jr.

From 1513 to 1559, the Spanish sent several major expeditions to Florida, but each one ended in complete failure. Juan Ponce de León’s colonization attempt, for example, was cut short by a Native American arrow that mortally wounded him, whereas Hernando de Soto died of disease after three years of aimless wandering.

Meanwhile, the first known European settlement in the continental United States, founded by Lucas Vázquez de Ayllón in 1526 in what’s believed to be present-day Georgia, was abandoned after just a few months. Another Spanish settlement, founded in 1559 in present-day Pensacola, Florida, didn’t do much better, lasting less than two years.

King Philip II changed his mind, however, once French Protestants (known as Huguenots) built Fort Caroline in present-day Jacksonville. Intent on ousting them, the king dispatched Menéndez de Avilés across the Atlantic Ocean in the summer of 1565.

Marching north in a rainstorm within days of founding St.Augustine, he and 500 men easily overran the fort and butchered most of its male inhabitants. Menéndez then learned that a number of French boats had shipwrecked while chasing his flagship down the coast.

Though the castaways surrendered without a fight, the Spanish tied them up and brutally stabbed them to death. A second group of French castaways was similarly massacred two weeks later. Ever since, that site south of St. Augustine has been called Matanzas (Spanish for “Slaughters”). In 1568, French privateers and their Native Americans allies took revenge by destroying Fort Caroline—which had been renamed Fort San Mateo—but never again would France establish a foothold in the area

(Jesse Greenspan. “8 Things You May Not Know About St. Augustine, Florida.” History.com. September 08, 2015)

Martín de Argüelles, Jr., was born in 1566, approximately 21 years before the birth of Virginia Dare in Virginia, in the Spanish colony of St. Augustine, Spanish Florida. Arguelles was the first child of European descent known to be born in what is now the continental United States. Martín's parents were Martín de Argüelles (Sr.) and Leonor Morales.

Author Fredrik de Costa says Arguelle might not have been known at all if he hadn't gone to court to claim salary overdue him from the Spanish army. His petition established his birth, the date (January 4, 1566), his parents, and his identity. It went into Spanish archives to be later discovered.

De Costa says …

“We were led to believe that American history began with Virginia Dare, and this story is published to remind the public that community life in St. Augustine existed well before 1600.”

(Malcolm Johnson. “Firsts.” Boca Ratan News. July 4, 1971.)

Martín de Argüelles, Jr.'s father was an Asturian hidalgo (member of the Spanish nobility) and one of the expeditioners who came to New Spain in the New World with Captain General Menéndez de Avilés in 1565. Argüelles Sr. was the first Alcalde (Mayor) of San Agustín, and had been in charge of munitions in the Florida forts of Santa María, San Agustín (now St. Augustine), and Santa Elena.

Martín Argüelles Jr. served the Spanish crown in Portugal and several garrisons and expeditions which embarked in the Spanish Armada which went in search of corsair Francis Drake. He was later transferred in 1594 from Havana, Cuba, to Mérida, Mexico, where he was appointed Executive Officer of the Mérida fortress and coast. Argüelles was married in Mérida.

The Library of Congress, Hispanic Reference Team Plumio, reports …

“We do not have a death date for Martin de Arguelles. To find it would a very difficult enterprise. As a royal official, there are probably documents about or by him at the Archivo General de Indias in Seville, Spain. There could also be documents in Mexico and Cuba. Perhaps, the best place would be the Archivos de Protocolos and Archivos Notariales in the city of Mérida, México.

“If he ever wrote a last will and testament, it may be at those places. But going through those documents would prove to be a very laborious undertaking. We also checked the Enciplopedia Universal Ilustrada, but could not find a reference to him.

“He seems to have been a minor official and information about him would be very hard to come by.”

Argüelles' descendants included José Argüelles, who was one of the colonizers of the Province of New Santander in New Spain in 1749, in what is now the Mexican state of Tamaulipas.

What Does It Mean?

No particular recognition of the first child of European ancestry will necessarily build a revisionist national history. Neither will it destroy strong tradition. However, shedding light on other theories could broaden our understandings of the truth. Although historical truth is often frail and can be prone to error, we should strive to lay bare mistakes – unwitting and intentional – and their historical consequences. To minimize misconceptions and to strengthen honest narratives allows us to see a more complete picture … and, to come closer to teaching the truth to our children.

Seniors Change Their Spots and Their Neural Connections

 

“For I have known them all already, known them all:

Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,

I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;

I know the voices dying with a dying fall

Beneath the music from a farther room.

So how should I presume?

“And I have known the eyes already, known them all—

The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,

And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,

When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,

Then how should I begin

To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?

And how should I presume?"

Excerpt from “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” 

By T. S. Eliot (1915)

The “butt-ends of my days and ways” – presuming the eventual finality. Eliot's poem is said to be a dramatic interior monologue of a man stricken with feelings of isolation and an incapability for decisive action. Prufrock's awareness of his own mortality is something we seniors face … realities we all settle into as roles of surviving this long.

As I continue to age – I am almost 70 years old – I realize one vital perception. We must be open to change, no matter our age. The need to deal with the future by changing for the better must not be restrained by old prejudices and by the fear of loss of control. Time changes our society and our environment: to live in denial in a time when everything seems different is stagnating inertia … the murkiest of existence … the foulest of those final “butt ends.”

It is true our aging minds become very hardwired. As we grow older, we tend to resist change because of this process. The neural pathways in our brain have become automatic to us, and we tend to fall back on our default or automatic behaviors when we try to implement changes. As the saying goes, “Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t know.”

The basal ganglia in the ancestral or primitive brain are responsible for these “wiring” habits. These clusters of nerve cell bodies are involved in functions such as automatic or routine behaviors (e.g., habits) that we are familiar with or that make us feel good. The basal ganglia play a large role in procedural learning and habit learning.

But, another part of the brain, the neocortex, controls higher-order brain functions such as conscious decision-making. The neocortex is capable of vast learning, as it conceives of time and plans for the future. It also mitigates the impulses of the primitive brain. Our brain must develop new neural connections to enact new behaviors. And, this is physically draining work. In other words, our conscious actions require much more effort.

Jonas Kaplan, a psychologist at the University of Southern California, has published evidence in Scientific Reports that this network is involved when it comes to thinking about closely held beliefs. Previously, Kaplan has found the default mode network is active when people read stories that reflect their personal values. Kaplan says …

“The psychological self is the brain’s extension of that. When our self feels attacked, our [brain is] going to bring to bear the same defenses that it has for protecting the body.”

(Jonas Kaplan et al. “Neural correlates of maintaining one’s political beliefs in the face of counterevidence.” Scientific Reports 6. 2016.)

A negative component set firmly in the mind of older folks often denies needed change. Past resentments – the ghosts of the past – are specters that lie in wait to haunt us. We are people with many age-old scars and wounds. An unhealed wound makes us rationalize that the evils committed by a few criminals are symptomatic of the way society in general is responsible for all the evils committed, denying our own accountability

Confronting and defeating ghosts of the past are not easy tasks for us. As we age, we face undeniable psychological challenges to change:

First, because of a decline in energy and loss of brain tissue, capacities for information processing and memory decline as life progresses.

Second, the experiences one has as one ages leave a gradually growing body of attitude-relevant knowledge within the individual that serves as a source of psychological stability

Finally, a corresponding increase in social support for one's attitudes takes place as one accumulates friends who share similar social background experiences and world views as a result of friend selection and social influence processes

(J. A. Krosnick and Duane F. Alwin. “Aging and Susceptibility To Attitude Change.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 1989.)

However, no matter our age, self-regulation is the process by which we can control or alter our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. Self-regulation involves overriding existing habits or contextually triggered impulses and sustaining efforts over time until a specified goal is reached. It involves the capacity to project oneself into the future, form adaptive attitudes, make plans, choose among alternatives, focus attention on pursuit goals, inhibit competing thoughts, and detect discrepancies between one's current states and goal states.

(Carstensen LL, Hartel CR, editors. “When I'm 64.”National Research Council (US) Committee on Aging Frontiers in Social Psychology, Personality, and Adult Developmental Psychology. 2006.)

Here is the good news. Now, after decades of research into the effects of aging, scientists are uncovering another, more mysterious change.

“The conclusion is exactly this: that we are not the same person for the whole of our life,” says René Mõttus, a psychologist from the University of Edinburgh. Far from being fixed in childhood, or around the age of 30 – as experts thought for years – it seems that our personalities are fluid and malleable. Mottus says … 

“People become nicer and more socially adapted. They’re increasingly able to balance their own expectations of life with societal demands.”

(Zaria Gorvett. “How your personality changes as you age.” BBC. March 16, 2020.)

Zaria Gorvett, science journalist from the BBC, explains the transition …

“Most of us would like to think of our personalities as relatively stable throughout our lives. But research suggests this is not the case. Our traits are ever shifting, and by the time we’re in our 70s and 80s, we’ve undergone a significant transformation. And while we’re used to couching aging in terms of deterioration and decline, the gradual modification of our personalities has some surprising upsides.

“We become more conscientious and agreeable, and less neurotic. The levels of the 'Dark Triad' personality traits, Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy also tend to go down – and with them, our risk of antisocial behaviors such as crime and substance abuse.

“Research has shown that we develop into more altruistic and trusting individuals. Our willpower increases and we develop a better sense of humor. Finally, the elderly have more control over their emotions. It’s arguably a winning combination – and one which suggests that the stereotype of older people as grumpy and curmudgeonly needs some revision.

While facing change can be devastating, we senior need to understand that the

myth that older people can’t handle change has less to do with age and more to do with personal preference. Someone who older today has experienced a remarkable amount of advancements over the course of their lifetime and has had to learn to adapt to their own set of changes, even if those things weren’t how to text or turn the webcam on.

Being open to change can lead to extroversion, conscientiousness, and openness to new experiences. And, for seniors, inclusiveness is a key to successfully accepting inevitable change. The fact is, those with generational change issues or a personality type that doesn't take well to openness find inclusiveness as others introduce them to next generation collaboration with specific objectives – this demystifies modification and empowers seniors to participate.

To close, a study led by the Rotman Research Institute at Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care, a premier international center for the study of human brain function in Toronto, found that old brains can, in fact, learn new tricks. Researchers found that older people make up for cognitive decline by using different areas of the brain to perform the same cognitive tasks as younger people.

("Old Brains Can Learn New Tricks: Study Shows Older People Use Different Areas Of The Brain To Perform Same 'Thinking Task' As Young." ScienceDaily. October 1999.)

So, let's summarize. Science confirms that we older Americans can be open and willing to change. It may not be easy to do so when our brains are already so hardwired and our old prejudices get in the way; however we have the ability to self-regulate and find new understandings. We can also grab ahold of our own neocortex and develop new connections that lead to positive actions. To refuse to change is to be less prepared for life's challenges … challenges that continue no matter our age. Being flexible also gives us something to look forward to – change, itself, can be freeing and liberating.

The Famous and Infamous Green Bean Casserole -- Dorcus Reilly and Me

 

Dorcas Reilly 

For the last many years I have made green bean casserole for Thanksgiving. This includes the infamous time I accidentally let a green bean can lid slide into the mix unnoticed – I baked the casserole lid and all. People ate it and said it tasted good until they found the metal lid after digging into the mix. Man, did I take a lot of abuse for that one. My wife never lets me live it down, and she gladly shares this story often as just one of my numerous cooking misadventures.

Anyhow, I am in charge of the casserole this Thanksgiving, and I recently stumbled onto the history of the green bean concoction. It is an interesting bit of trivia for the holiday, so I thought I would share it with you.

The Campbell’s Soup Company had its own kitchen, in Camden, New Jersey, dedicated to pumping out recipe pamphlets. In 1955, a home economist named Dorcas Reilly worked as a supervisor it the home economics department of the Campbell's Test kitchen, and she was tasked with creating a recipe for a feature that would appear in the Associated Press. The recipe had to be based on ingredients that any home cook would have on hand, including Campbell’s mushroom soup and green beans.

(Stephanie Butler. “The Origins of the Mysterious Green Bean Casserole.” History.com.August 31, 2018.)

Dorcas (Which, by the way, was pretty much what I felt like after cooking my own “lid recipe” – a real “dork.”) had earned a degree in home economics from Drexel University (known then as the Drexel Institute of Technology). According to Today’s Vidya Rao, she and her team initially toyed with adding celery salt and ham to the recipe, but ultimately settled on six simple, affordable ingredients that could be stirred together in a casserole dish and popped into the oven for 25 minutes. The prep time was minimal; the dish worked well with frozen or canned green beans, and the fried onions were pre-packaged.

(Brigit Katz. “The Woman Who Invented the Green Bean Casserole.” Smithsonain Magazine. October 26, 2018.)

Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom variety had been around since 1934. It was widely used as casserole filler in the Midwest, popping up in enough Minnesotan hotdish recipes that it was sometimes referred to as “Lutheran binder” – those militant Lutherans, using a creamy soup to bind casseroles together. But no one thought to add frozen green beans to the mix until Reilly came along. The fried onions on top were an easy way to add texture and brighten the color of a grey-green dish, and to add a certain festive touch to the proceedings.

So in 1955, Dorcus successfully devised and tested the green bean casserole recipe. Reilly’s recipe was immediately popular. Originally called “Green Bean Bake, it was the perfect recipe for post-war America when cheap, fuss-free cooking was all the rage. The lifting of wartime rations on canned goods, coupled with innovations in canning and freezing that made packaged foods more accessible than ever, created a culture of convenience cooking. Made with minimal ingredients almost always on hand and easily fixed the day ahead and reheated, green bean casserole was a hit. Though they continued to shoulder the responsibility of keeping the family fed, an ever-growing number of women were entering the workforce, fueling the demand for easy-to-make meals.

“We all thought this is very nice, etc., and then when we got the feelings of the consumer, we were really kinda pleasantly shocked,” Reilly once said. “I’m very proud of this, and I was shocked when I realized how popular it had become.” She always insisted the invention was a team effort.

(Brigit Katz. “The Woman Who Invented the Green Bean Casserole.” Smithsonain Magazine. October 26, 2018.)

Recipe Variation   

Dorcas would often share that the first time she made her famous recipe, it did not receive the highest rating in Campbell’s internal testing. Yet, it was her persistence and creativity that led to an enduring recipe that will live on for decades to come.

(“IN MEMORY OF THE AMERICAN INVENTOR DORCAS REILLY.” Campbells. October 19, 2018.)

In a 2005 AP interview marking the recipe's 50th anniversary, Reilly said she didn't remember having a hand in it because the dish was among hundreds that were created during her time at Campbell's. She also helped create a tomato soup meatloaf, a tuna noodle casserole and Sloppy Joe-like "souperburgers."

(Shawn Marsh. “Woman who created iconic Campbell's Soup green bean casserole dies at 92.” The Associated Press. October 24, 2018.)

Campbell’s now estimates 40% of the Cream of Mushroom soup sold in the US goes into making green bean casserole. And, this Thanksgiving, some 20 million Americans will enjoy a green bean casserole.

In 2002, Campbell's donated Dorcas Reilly's original recipe card to the National Inventors Hall of Fame. And Reilly kept cooking. She said in 2013 that she was still experimenting in her own kitchen. Her motto at work and at home, she said, was food should be fun; food should be happy.

Reilly said that whenever Campbell Soup would have a recipe contest, she would always see recipes submitted that were variations on her green bean casserole recipe, and they’d be called something like “Grandma’s green bean casserole.”

Dorcas Reilly died in Haddonfield, New Jersey, on October 15, 2018, at the age of 92. You may not know her name, but her legacy will live on atop the tables of millions of families on Thanksgiving. Reilly’s famous recipe is still found on Campbell Soup can labels and in ads and commercials. Campbell’s officials say that the recipe is so easy that absolutely anyone can make it … even me.

To close, somehow I feel associated with Dorcas Reilly – an inventive American cook. If I ever find my Tin Lid Green Bean Casserole with its silvery-white chemical element of atomic number 50 catches on, I will be yet another link in her long legacy. Just a warning though – don't try this lid recipe at home. My shame continues to this day.

Note: The canned food industry in the United States stopped using lead-soldered cans in 1991. In 1995, the Food and Drug Administration issued a final rule prohibiting the use of lead solder in all food cans, including imported products. Metal cans, which are made of sheet steel - sometimes with a coating of tin - are now welded closed at the seams. Thank you, Lord.

(“Remembering Dorcas Reilly, Inventor Of The Classic Green-Bean Casserole.” All Things Considered. National Public Radio. November 22, 2018.)

The First Thanksgiving -- The Few, The Proud, The WOMEN

 

On September 16, 1620, 102 passengers boarded the Mayflower at Plymouth, England, bound for Virginia. Of these, only 18 adult women boarded the ship, with three of them at least six months pregnant. These child-bearing women were Susanna White, Mary Allerton and Elizabeth Hopkins – all of whom braved the stormy Atlantic knowing that they would give birth either at sea in desperate conditions or in their hoped destination of America. Oceanus, son of Stephen and Elizabeth Hopkins, was the born on the Mayflower during the 66 day crossing?

All the adult women on the Mayflower were married. There were no single women – although there were a few teenage girls nearing marriageable age.

(Women of the Mayflower.” Mayflower 400. https://www.mayflower400uk.org/education/women-of-the-mayflower/.)

Note: Please access this site for detailed information on individual Pilgrim women: https://www.mayflower400uk.org/education/women-of-the-mayflower/

Women in 1620 had little rights and their history is patchy, given little thought was given to recording their endeavors. Governor William Bradford reported that the Pilgrims were worried that the "weak bodies of women" would not be able to withstand the rigors of a trans-Atlantic voyage and the construction of a colony.

This meant the Pilgrim husband, as head of the household, had an important and difficult decision to make. Building a colony would be hard on a woman's "weaker body." It might be safer and more healthy to leave her behind, and have her come later once the houses were built, and the general safety and success of the colony were better established. But that could be several years. Could he live several years without his wife? How strong was his wife anyway, could she really handle it? Was it right to put your wife's life in danger in this manner?

Prior to the Mayflower, very few English women had made the voyage across the ocean. Sir Walter Raleigh's Roanoke colony arrived in Virginia in 1587, and amongst those 120 colonists there were 17 women: a baby girl, Virginia Dare, was born after arrival. When re-supply ships came from England, they could not relocate the people. The colony had mysteriously disappeared, and was never seen again. The Jamestown Colony was founded in 1607, but relatively few women had yet made the voyage and taken up residence there.

According to The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Women Who Came in the Mayflower by Annie Russell Marble, there were women with frail bodies on the Mayflower, like Rose Standish and Katherine Carver, but there were strong physiques and dauntless hearts sustained to great old age, matrons like Susanna White and Elizabeth Hopkins and young women like Priscilla Mullins, Mary Chilton, Elizabeth Tilley and Constance Hopkins.

(Annie Russell Marble. The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Women Who Came in the Mayflower. Gurenberg.org. January 2005.)

When the ship arrived in Cape Cod, the men went to shore – spending two months trying to find a suitable place to settle before building storehouses and creating the beginnings of Plymouth. The women stayed on the Mayflower to care for the sick and the young – in damp, crowded and filthy conditions, which meant many would die before they were able to step foot on land.

“Women of Early Plymouth.” Caleb Johnson's Mayflowerhistory.com.)

While no women would die during the Mayflower's voyage, life after arrival proved extremely difficult. In fact, 78% of the women would die the first winter, a far higher percentage than for men or children. Dorothy Bradford was the first woman to die, and the only woman who died in the month of December. While many of the men, including her husband, were out exploring on Cape Cod, she accidentally fell off the Mayflower into the bitter cold waters of Provincetown Harbor.

Annie Russell Marble reports:

“The toll of deaths increased and the illness spread until, at one time, there were only "six or seven sound persons" to minister to the sick and to bury the dead. Fifteen of the twenty-nine women who sailed from England and Holland were buried on Plymouth hillside during the winter and spring. (Most of the women's death dates were not recorded – note.) They were: Rose Standish (January 29); Elizabeth, wife of Edward Winslow (March 24) ; Mary, wife of Isaac Allerton (February 25); Sarah, wife of Francis Eaton; Katherine, wife of Governor John Carver; Alice, wife of John Rigdale; Ann, wife of Edward Fuller; Bridget and Ann Tilley, wives of John and Edward; Alice, wife of John Mullins or Molines; Mrs. James Chilton; Mrs. Christopher Martin; Mrs. Thomas Tinker; possibly Mrs. John Turner, and Ellen More, the orphan ward of Edward Winslow.

“Nearly twice as many men as women died during those fateful months of 1621. Can we 'imagine' the courage required by the few women who remained after this devastation, as the wolves were heard howling in the night, the food supplies were fast disappearing, and the houses of shelter were delayed in completion by "frost and much foul weather," and by the very few men in physical condition to rive timber or to thatch roofs? The common house, twenty foot square, was crowded with the sick, among them Carver and Bradford, who were obliged 'to rise in good speed' when the roof caught on fire, and their loaded muskets in rows beside the beds threatened an explosion. [

Footnote: Mourt's Relation

Only five women survived the first harsh winter including an epidemic of disease that swept through the colony, felling nearly half the original group. One of the five survivors, Mrs. Katherine Carver, died in May of a "broken heart," her husband John having died of sunstroke a month earlier.

Some 78 percent of the women who had arrived on the Mayflower had died during the first winter, a far higher percentage than for men or children. “For the English, [the first Thanksgiving] was also celebrating the fact that they had survived their first year here in New England,” Tom Begley – the executive liaison for administration, research and special projects at Plimoth Plantation – points out.

(Sarah Pruitt. “Colonists at the First Thanksgiving Were Mostly Men Because Women Had Perished.” History.com. November 16, 2018.)

53 colonists are believed to have attended that first Thanksgiving, including 22 men, and only four married women, and more than 25 children and teenagers. The four women were Susanna (White) Winslow, Eleanor Billington, Elizabeth Hopkins, and Mary Brewster. Susanna Winslow was the widow of William White who died the first winter; she remarried to Edward Winslow, whose wife Elizabeth had also died the first winter.

Incidentally, all the wives who had been left behind were still living. Four of them came on the ship Anne in 1623, had additional children, and raised their families at Plymouth.

“Identifying the origins of the female pilgrims is a real challenge as there is generally so little information recorded about them – women had very few rights at that time, but they are so significant when painting the picture of the Pilgrim history.”

Nearly all of what historians have learned about the first Thanksgiving comes from a single eyewitness report: a letter written in December 1621 by Edward Winslow, one of the 100 or so people who sailed from England aboard the Mayflower in 1620 and founded Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts. William Bradford, Plymouth’s governor in 1621, wrote briefly of the event in Of Plymouth Plantation, his history of the colony, but that was more than 20 years after the feast itself.

That means there are two (and only two) primary sources for the events of autumn 1621 in Plymouth: Edward Winslow writing in Mourt's Relation and William Bradford writing in Of Plymouth Plantation.

Pilgrim Hall Museum at Pilgrimhall.org. allows us to access the following information about the first Thanksgiving

The 53 Pilgrims at the First Thanksgiving

William Bradford lists the Mayflower passengers and also tells us who died during the first winter of 1620/1621 and spring of 1621. No other ships arrived in Plymouth until after the "First Thanksgiving" celebration. The Pilgrims at the "First Thanksgiving" are all the Mayflower survivors.

The attendees were:

4 MARRIED WOMEN: Eleanor Billington, Mary Brewster, Elizabeth Hopkins, Susanna White Winslow.

5 ADOLESCENT GIRLS: Mary Chilton (14), Constance Hopkins (13 or 14), Priscilla Mullins (19), Elizabeth Tilley (14 or15) and Dorothy, the Carver's unnamed maidservant, perhaps

18 or 19. ADOLESCENT BOYS: Francis & John Billington, John Cooke, John Crackston, Samuel Fuller (2d), Giles Hopkins, William Latham, Joseph Rogers, Henry Samson.

13 YOUNG CHILDREN: Bartholomew, Mary & Remember Allerton, Love & Wrestling Brewster, Humility Cooper, Samuel Eaton, Damaris & Oceanus Hopkins, Desire Minter, Richard More, Resolved & Peregrine White.

22 MEN: John Alden, Isaac Allerton, John Billington, William Bradford, William Brewster, Peter Brown, Francis Cooke, Edward Doty, Francis Eaton, [first name unknown] Ely, Samuel Fuller, Richard Gardiner, John Goodman, Stephen Hopkins, John Howland, Edward Lester, George Soule, Myles Standish, William Trevor, Richard Warren, Edward Winslow, Gilbert Winslow.

Note: Probably at least that many Wampanoag women were at the harvest feast. The Pilgrim men mentioned the Native men, but said little about any women from either side.

FAMILY GROUPS:

 ALDEN: John

 ALLERTON: Isaac with children Bartholomew, Mary, Remember; the Allerton servant William Latham

 BILLINGTON: John & Eleanor with sons Francis, John Jr.

 BRADFORD: William

 BREWSTER: William & Mary with sons Love, Wrestling; their ward Richard More

 BROWNE / BROWN: Peter

 CARVER: The Carver ward Desire Minter; the Carver servant John Howland; the Carver maidservant Dorothy

. CHILTON: Mary

 COOKE: Francis with son John

 CRACKSTON: John

 EATON: Francis with son Samuel

 ELY: Unknown adult man

 FULLER: Samuel with nephew Samuel 2d

 GARDINER: Richard

 GOODMAN: John

 HOPKINS: Stephen & Elizabeth with Giles, Constance, Damaris, Oceanus; their servants Edward Doty and Edward Leister.

 MULLINS: Priscilla

 ROGERS: Joseph

 STANDISH: Myles

 TILLEY: Elizabeth

 TILLEY: Tilley wards Humility Cooper and Henry Samson

 TREVOR / TREVORE: William

 WARREN: Richard

 WINSLOW: Edward & Susanna with her sons Resolved White & Peregrine White; Winslow servant George Soule

 WINSLOW: Gilbert Note: In Of Plymouth Plantation

Graphic of Mayflower Passengers who survived to First Thanksgiving in 1621 at Pilgrim Hall Museum. Plymouth, MA. Photo by Jim Steinhart011,

Pilgrim women lived in a society which believed that women were created by God for man’s benefit, and for him to subjugate. While women were required to submit to their husbands, the Pilgrims also believed that husbands were to love their wives. Life for these women was spartan and exceedingly difficult.

The horrors these faithful Pilgrim women endured were unimaginable – homeless and facing a new and alien country, they had to quickly adjust to a new way of life. Their supply of food was quickly disappearing, and completion of the housing was delayed by the foul weather and the lack of men strong enough to work.

These few Pilgrim women nursed the sick, cared for the children, and established new homes. Largely unsung today, they were strong, courageous, and vital to the success of the new colony. Their place in history should be uplifted.

“Faint not, poor soul, in God still trust;
Fear not the things thou suffer must;
For, whom he loves he doth chastise,
And then all tears wipes from their eyes.”

William Bradford
Plymouth Colony Governor

Trump Blames Blacks For Election Fraud

 

“The pattern is clear … Historically anytime there’s been access to the ballot box extended to Black voters, there’s always been a backlash and effort to curtail that. That’s the American tradition at this point. Those who have been at the forefront of the pursuit of racial justice and equity have been regarded as a threat to the country when what they really are, what their direct access to the ballot box is really a direct threat to white supremacy.

“Trump’s laser focus (challenging the election) on predominantly Black cities is not the only evidence that the tradition continues. Even the language used to describe the demands for selective inquiries into voting in Detroit, Atlanta, Philadelphia and Milwaukee echo the language of Jim Crow-era segregationists."

– John Cusick, a litigation fellow at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund who focuses much of his work on voting rights

In each of the states where the Trump team has challenged the election outcome or Republican members of boards of election have hesitated to certify results, there has been a consistent theme: The problem areas, the places where they have expressed nonspecific wrongdoing and fraud, without clear evidence, have significant Black populations.

(Janell Ross and Janelle Griffith. “How Trump's legal battles to overturn the election undermine the Black vote.” NBC News. November 24, 2020.)

Janell Ross, reporter for NBC BLK, and Janelle Griffith, national reporter for NBC News report …

“Philadelphia is 42.3 percent Black, Detroit is 78.6 percent Black and nearly 52 percent of Atlanta residents are Black. The challenges to these votes tap a rich and productive vein of voter suppression. Now, as Trump and his supporters continue to lob unsupported claims of voting irregularities and fraud, they appear to be reviving a tradition of Black voter exclusion in the United States.”

First, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and suggested Georgia toss out any ballot from an area with a high rate of nonmatching signatures, Graham said, according to Raffensperger and others on the call.

Black voters have long been more likely than others to see their ballots rejected. Had Georgia followed Graham’s request and refused to count any ballot from an area with an unusual number of signature match problems, the move would almost certainly have nullified votes cast in areas with large numbers of Black and Latino voters or new citizens, groups which Trump did not carry.

Then, at a Washington press conference last week, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Trump's personal lawyer, claimed the president’s campaign had identified 300,000 “illegitimate ballots” cast in Michigan. He offered no evidence supporting his claims but suggested Trump would be the victor there, if the results in Wayne County, which includes Detroit and about half the state’s Black population, were just excluded.

Trump operatives also claimed massive fraud shaped the outcomes in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Milwaukee and the area around Madison, Wisconsin. Each of those cities are in key swing states. Most also have larger-than-average Black populations.

“Really the themes that we see, that persist, are this: Black people are corrupt, Black people are incompetent and Black people can’t be trusted.”

– Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel after the Trump campaign filed its lawsuit against Wayne County.

Such a plainly racist strategy to contest the election erodes Black voters’ trust in elections. Fears persist that Trump’s allies will undermine democracy and disenfranchise Black Americans and other voters of color.

Hypocritical for a president who claims he has “done more for the black community than any other president besides Abraham Lincoln”? Consider his real view of people of color.

During the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump turned his attention to Black Americans at a rally in Dimondale, Michigan, a Lansing suburb, Trump delivered this assessment of how he views the Black electorate:

“What do you (African Americans) have to lose by trying something new, like Trump? You’re living in poverty, your schools are no good. You have no jobs, 58% of your youth is unemployed — what the hell do you have to lose?"

Apparently, a lot.

About 87% of Black voters nationwide chose Biden over Trump, according to preliminary national exit polling. Those early exit polls show that 19% of Black men voted for Trump, as did 9% of Black women.

An Associated Press VoteCast survey showed overall larger Black support for Biden – 90%. According to the AP survey, 12% of Black men voted for Trump, while only 6% of Black women supported him.

Suzette Hackney of USA TODAY explains how Trump has completely lost the votes and confidence of Blacks …

“Trump's lack of leadership and incompetence allowed the deadly coronavirus to run rampant, disproportionately affecting Black people. Trump has attacked Black athletes, Black journalists and Black female members of Congress. He has called African countries "s---holes." He has aligned himself with white nationalists, called Black Lives Matter a symbol of hate, and answered cries for freedom during racial justice protests this summer with a "law and order" rhetoric.”

(Suzette Hackney. “Black voters steer America toward moral clarity in presidential race.” USA TODAY. November 12, 2020.)

Led by Trump, White Nationalist American has a new “twist.” They no longer block Blacks from voting; instead, these right-wingers allow Blacks to vote but do not want their votes to count.

According to Trump, these votes were illegitimate by dint of where they were cast. In his own words …

“Detroit and Philadelphia are known as two of the most corrupt political places anywhere in our country – easily. They cannot be responsible for engineering the outcome of a presidential race.”

-- Donald Trump, November 05, 2020

The danger in raising the specter of voter fraud is that it suggests that Black and brown voters are dangerous and should be distrusted. That danger is of no concern to Donald Trump. His only desire is to secure the presidency for another four years … a desire he plans to execute by hook or by crook. His obvious attempt to manipulate and control the minority vote defines his racism.

Besides, the narcissist must always have someone to blame for his own failures.

"I think it’s obvious that it's because of Black people in Milwaukee and Hispanic people in Milwaukee who overwhelmingly voted for Joe Biden. I think we are an easy scapegoat for President Trump's loss."

– Reggie Jackson, a local historian and head griot of America's Black Holocaust Museum in Milwaukee (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel 11/18/2020)

The First Thanksgiving -- Perspectives From American History

 

“My country, ’tis of thee,

Sweet land of liberty,

Of thee I sing;

Land where my fathers died,

Land of the pilgrims’ pride,

From ev’ry mountainside

Let freedom ring!”

– “America: My Country 'Tis of Thee” by Samuel Francis Smith, 1832

America – land where “my fathers died.” Which “American” fathers made the ultimate sacrifice for freedom? It is a legitimate question in a land of immigrants. Before we mindlessly mouth this well-known anthem, perhaps we should understand the “pilgrims' pride.” What is the lesson of that pride in our “sweet land” today?

o successful relationships lies solely in our ability to take the perspective of another. Originally credited to Native Americans, the idiom “Before you judge a man, walk a mile in his shoes (moccasins)” is a reminder to practice empathy. If a person cannot take the perspective of opponents, then his or her understanding of the issue is limited and incomplete.

It's Thanksgiving in America once more. This national holiday commemorates a harvest festival celebrated by the Pilgrims in 1621 and a time of remembrance to consider the many wonderful blessings we still enjoy. In fact, we were raised and educated to observe Thanksgiving in the same heartfelt, sincere manner that the Pilgrims did on the first Thanksgiving in North America.

The mainstream version of the Thanksgiving story paints a picture of courageous, Christian settlers, braving the perils of the New World and with the help of some friendly Natives, finding a way to make a new life for themselves. In the days around Thanksgiving, many teachers focus in on this happy story, helping students make American Indian headdresses out of construction paper and holding Thanksgiving reenactments in their classrooms.

Therein lies a different perspective – a perspective of the first inhabitants of America. This perspective, or lack of it, raises important considerations on the holiday. Thanksgiving is perpetuated in myth as a happy celebration of camaraderie and partnership, but it was, most certainly, a tense affair, fraught with political implications.

Questions about celebrating the holiday continue. Do students properly recognize the diversity of Native American tribes? Without a thorough understanding of the spiritual and cultural significance of indigenous people, do they mimic Native Americans? But much more important: Are they taught the truth about the meaning of Thanksgiving as an event that resonated throughout U.S. history – a factual, accurate picture of what happened in Plymouth in 1621?

The Pilgrim Perspective

With the help of the indigenous "Indians" in the region, the summer of 1621 was productive as recorded by William Bradford, Governor of the Plymouth Colony intermittently for about 30 years between 1621 and 1657. In his diary, Bradford wrote …

“They begane now to gather in ye small harvest they had, and to fitte up their houses and dwellings against winter, being all well recovered in health & strenght, and had all things in good plenty; for as some were thus imployed in affairs abroad, others were excersised in fishing, aboute codd, & bass, & other fish, of which yey tooke good store, of which every family had their portion. All ye soūer ther was no wante. And now begane to come in store of foule, as winter aproached, of which this place did abound when they came first (but afterward decreased by degrees).

“And besids water foule, ther was great store of wild Turkies, of which they tooke many, besids venison, &c. Besids they had aboute a peck a meale a weeke to a person, or now since harvest, Indean come to yt proportion. Which made many afterwards write so largly of their plenty hear to their freinds in England, which were not fained, but true reports.”

– William Bradford, excerpts are from his text Of Plymouth Plantation, which recounts the history of the colony from 1620-1647.

Another brief account was written by Edward Winslow – diplomat, printer, author, trader and politician – who was also described as the designated defender of New England's reputation. According to Winslow, in addition to their regular expressions of reverence and thanksgiving to God, by the Autumn of 1621 the surviving 53 Pilgrims had enough produce to hold a three day "harvest feast." That feast was described in the journal of Edward Winslow:

"Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a special manner rejoice together, after we had gathered the fruits of our labors; they four in one day killed as much fowl, as with a little help beside, served the Company almost a week, at which time amongst other Recreations, we exercised our Arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and amongst the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five Deer, which they brought to the Plantation and bestowed on our Governor, and upon the Captain and others. And although it be not always so plentiful, as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want, that we often wish you partakers of our plenty."

–Edward Winslow, booklet Mourt's Relation (full title: A Relation or Journal of the Beginning and Proceedings of the English Plantation Settled at Plimoth in New England), December, 1621

As far as we know, these are the only first-hand written descriptions of the First Thanksgiving, which probably should be called the 1621 Harvest Feast instead. It was a singular event, one which happened only, as far as we know, that one fall in 1621 and also one which, if we trust Bradford, was not of great import. Bradford’s chronicle of the Plimoth Colony, Of Plimoth Plantation, does not even mention any Native involvement at all. 

Winslow's writing (Mourt’s Relation), on the other hand, has a much more detailed description of the 1621 Harvest Feast. Winslow chronologically lays out the events of the Feast:

1- the harvest was gotten in

2- the Governor sent out men fowling, shooting enough fowl to last them a week

3- at the same time, they exercised their arms among other things

4- and many of the Indians came among them, including their greatest King

Massasoit, with some ninety men who feasted and were entertained by the

colonists for three days

5- the Natives went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation

and bestowed on our governor, and upon the captain, and others

The description’s final sentence sums up one of the purposes of the work overall “And although it be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.” It basically says “Having a great time, wish you were here.” Mourt’s Relation was written as a propaganda and informational tract.

The booklet has a tendency to overlook some of the troubles and deaths of the first winter and emphasizes the relations with the natives and the bounty of the land- generally sending the message back to England that New England is a wonderful and bountiful place full of Indians who can be negotiated and dealt with to the advantage of the English.

(Craig Chartier. “History of Thanksgiving.” Plymouth Archelogical Rediscovery Project.)

Massasoit, Wampanoag Indian chief  

The Native American Perspective

Charles C. Mann, author of 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus – which which won the National Academies’ Keck Award for best book of the year in 2006 – describes a different Thanksgiving.

According to Mann, “Despite European guns, the Indians’ greater numbers, entrenched positions, knowledge of the terrain and superb archery made them formidable adversaries.” Pilgrims’ accounts of indigenous leaders repeatedly describe them as mythically robust, striking of countenance, and extremely healthy.

The settlers, by contrast, were often malnourished, deficient in hygiene, and – as a population largely made up of common citizens seeking religious independence, with little knowledge of European farming practices – resistant to teaching. The settlers were “utterly dependent,” Mann documents, upon Indigenous charity and good faith.

(Alison Cagle. “Celebrate Indigenous History This Thanksgiving.” Sierra. November 20, 2018.)

Still, Mann finds the first Thanksgiving wasn’t actually that big of a deal. Likely, it was just a routine English harvest celebration. More significant—and less remembered—was the peace treaty that the parties established seven months earlier, which lasted for 50 years.

The leaders of the Plymouth colonists, acting on behalf of King James I, made a defensive alliance with Massasoit, chief of the Wampanoags. The agreement, in which both parties promised to not “doe hurt” to one another, was the first treaty between a Native American tribe and a group of American colonists. According to the treaty, if a Wampanoag broke the peace, he would be sent to Plymouth for punishment; if a colonist broke the law, he would likewise be sent to the Wampanoags.

(“The Pilgrim-Wampanoag peace treaty.” History A&E.February 09, 2010.)

The reader must understand the background. A year before the first Thanksgiving, the pilgrims raided Native American graves. When the pilgrims arrived in Cape Cod, they were incredibly unprepared. They showed up six weeks before winter with practically no food. And, in a desperate state, the pilgrims robbed corn from Native Americans graves and storehouses soon after they arrived.

To learn how to farm sustainably, the pilgrims eventually required help from Tisquantum, an English-speaking Native American who had been staying with the Wampanoag.

The pilgrims could have actually only settled at Plymouth because thousands of Native Americans, including many Wampanoag, had been killed by disease. If the pilgrims had arrived in Cape Cod three years earlier, they might not have found those abandoned graves and storehouses … in fact, they might not have had space to land. Plymouth was established on top of a village that had been deserted by disease. The pilgrims didn’t know it, but they were moving into a cemetery.

(Becky Little. “A few things you (probably) don’t know about Thanksgiving.” National Geographic. November 20, 2018.)

The Pilgrim-centric narrative of the first Thanksgiving focuses a great deal on the colonists' weakness and troubled arrival in North America – since the winter of 1620 half of them had died. The help from the Wampanoag, and the peace with them, was crucial to the colonists' survival.

The Wampanoag had very recently become incredibly weakened themselves. Just five years earlier, there had been 20,000 or so Wampanoag subjects – but after an unimaginably rapid and horrific spread of infectious disease (inadvertently brought by Europeans), all but a thousand or so had died by 1621.

The disease was likely viral hepatitis, according to a study by Arthur E. Speiss, of the Maine Historic Preservation Commission, and Bruce D. Spiess, of the Medical College of Virginia. Beginning in 1616, the pestilence took at least three years to exhaust itself and killed as much as 90 percent of the people in coastal New England.

So when Massasoit and his group of about 90 Wampanoag came to feast with the Plymouth Bay colonists, they were actually bringing a fair portion of their remaining strength. They still outnumbered the Plymouth colonists, about 50 of whom had survived that first winter. But far from being in a position of security and power, the Wampanoag were instead reeling from a recent dreadful catastrophe.

(Andrew Proko. “What they didn't teach you about the first Thanksgiving in school.” Vox. November 26, 2015.)

“Governor Bradford is said to have attributed the plague to “the good hand of God,” which “favored our beginnings” by “sweeping away great multitudes of the natives …that he might make room for us.”

– Charles C. Mann, 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus

Charles Mann makes the point that the strategies Native Americans first pursued when encountering European colonists often had much more to do with counterbalancing their own longtime rivals, who were known and consistent threats, than the Europeans themselves. A powerful rival people to the west, the Narragansett, had been basically untouched by the disease. This created a political crisis" for the Wampanoag.  

"Because the hostility between the Wampanoag and the neighboring Narragansett had restricted contact between them, the disease had not spread to the latter. Massasoit's people were not only beset by loss, they were in danger of subjugation," Mann writes.

This provides the context for the alliance between Massasoit and the Plymouth colonists. Massasoit agreed to ally with the Plymouth colonists explicitly in hopes of using them against the Narragansett. The alliance was agreed to in March 1621, and the "first Thanksgiving" occurred that fall.

One must also consider that Europeans were valuable trading partners for the Wampanoag and other Native Americans in the area because they traded steel knives and axes for beaver pelts—something that, in the beaver-rich New England area, the Wampanoag considered essentially worthless.

“It’s a little like somebody comes to your door, and says I’ll give you gold if you give me a rock. The Wampanoag thought: if we tie ourselves to these guys, everybody else will be hesitant to attack us, because they could drive away these people who are willing to pay gold for rocks.”

– Charles C. Mann

The depletion of Wampanoag territory presented an opportunity for European colonizers – they pounced on the newly available and formerly hostile land. Who were these pilgrims, exactly? An expedition of British colonists, seeking to escape King James’s rule by sailing to the area of Cape Cod, which was granted to them via the Virginia Company of Plymouth.

The peace brought about by that alliance lasted 50 years, but from the perspective of the increasingly threatened tribes, it was borrowed time. Emboldened by the success of the Plymouth Pilgrims’ survival, tens of thousands of European settlers descended on New England, colonizing the emptied Wampanoag territory and taking advantage of similar alliances borne from tribal rivalries.

By 1675, the pact with the pilgrims at Plymouth had all but disintegrated. The Europeans gained enough numbers in New England to establish a military foothold, and the northeastern Algonquin tribes were nearly wholly eliminated by war, disease, or enslavement.

In 1675, one of Massasoit's sons, angered by the colonists’ laws, launched what was perhaps an inevitable attack. Indians from dozens of groups joined in. The conflict, brutal and sad, tore through New England.

And, as we know, the Europeans won. Historians attribute part of the victory to Indian unwillingness to match the European tactic of massacring whole villages. Another reason was manpower—by then the colonists outnumbered the Natives.

Groups like the Narragansett, that had been spared by the epidemic of 1616, were crushed by a smallpox epidemic in 1633. A third to half of the remaining Indians in New England died of European diseases. The People of the First Light could avoid or adapt to European technology but not to European germs. Their societies were destroyed by weapons their opponents could not control and did not even know they possessed.

(Charles C. Mann. “Native Intelligence.” Smithsonian Magazine. December 20. 2005.)

What really happened at the first Thanksgiving? Historians argue the question to this day. History also raises this question: “Why should Native people celebrate Thanksgiving?” Many Natives particularly in the New England area remember this attempted genocide as a factual part of their history and are reminded each year during the modern Thanksgiving.

The United American Indians of New England meet each year at Plymouth Rock on Cole’s Hill for a Day of Mourning. They gather at the feet of a statue of Grand Sachem Massasoit of the Wampanoag to remember and reflect in the hope that America will never forget

(Dennis Zotigh. “Do American Indians celebrate Thanksgiving?” Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian. November 26, 2019,)

Allow me to end this entry by walking in the moccasins of one American Native,

Sean Sherman was born and raised on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota in the 1970s, and he is a member of the Oglala Lakota Sioux Tribe.

Sherman is the founder and CEO of “The Sioux Chef” and the author of The Sioux Chef’s Indigenous Kitchen, which won the 2018 James Beard Award for best American cookbook.

“Many of my indigenous brothers and sisters refuse to celebrate Thanksgiving, protesting the whitewashing of the horrors our ancestors went through, and I don’t blame them. But I have not abandoned the holiday. I have just changed how I practice it.

“The thing is, we do not need the poisonous “pilgrims and Indians” narrative. We do not need that illusion of past unity to actually unite people today. Instead, we can focus simply on values that apply to everybody: togetherness, generosity and gratitude. And we can make the day about what everybody wants to talk and think about anyway: the food.

“People may not realize it, but what every person in this country shares, and the very history of this nation, has been in front of us the whole time. Most of our Thanksgiving recipes are made with indigenous foods: turkey, corn, beans, pumpkins, maple, wild rice and the like. We should embrace this.”

– Sean Sherman, Time, November 11, 2019