Thanksgiving is generally filled with memories of a lazy day, stuffing, and football and a pie or two. Turkey in the oven by 5:00 am and the house smelling heavenly as we watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. We have all that thanks to the Pilgrims, like it or not.
Without the Pilgrims, we probably wouldn’t have a day dedicated to eating turkey and pumpkin pie and giving thanks. But did you know the Pilgrims didn’t actually eat turkey and pumpkin pie? Here are a few facts you probably didn’t know about the Pilgrims.
The Mayflower didn’t land in Plymouth first. The Mayflower first landed at the tip of Cape Cod, in what is now Provincetown. They had hoped to make it to the mouth of the Hudson River and find fertile farmland north of present-day New York City, but bad weather forced them to change their plans. They wanted to try for the Hudson River again, but winter set in and low supplies caused them to continue on across Cape Cod Bay to Plymouth with 102 passengers.
Plymouth, Massachusetts wasn’t named for Plymouth, England. The Pilgrims departed from Plymouth, England, but aren’t responsible for naming Plymouth, Massachusetts. It had been named that, years earlier by explorers in the regions and was marked as Plymouth – or Plimoth (spellings varied) – on maps. It’s just an odd coincidence that the Mayflower sailed from and landed in a town called Plymouth.
Some of the Mayflower’s passengers had been to America before. Several of the Mayflower’s crew had made the passage before, on either fishing or exploration trips. One of them, Stephen Hopkins, tried to settle at Jamestown 10 years earlier. On his way to join the settlement, his ship wrecked off the coast of Bermuda. Hopkins eventually returned to England and joined the Mayflower as a member of the sympathetic group of supporters from London.
The pilgrims dwindled – and then flourished. Nearly half of the Mayflower passengers and crew died during the harsh winter of 1621. To hide their dwindling numbers from the Native Americans, they buried their dead at night in unmarked graves. Ultimately, the pilgrims flourished. Over the next 70 years, the colony grew to more than 3,000 people. Today, more than 35 million people are direct descendants of the pilgrims, including the likes of John Adams, Franklin Roosevelt, Marilyn Monroe, and Clint Eastwood.
The Pilgrims didn’t wear just black clothes. They wore many different colors. Contrary to the traditional images, the pilgrims did not wear tall, black hats with buckles on them, nor did they have buckles on their shoes. The Pilgrims used muskets, not blunderbusses. Blunderbusses weren’t developed until nearly 30 years later. Pilgrims would not have eaten potatoes because Europeans believed they were poisonous at the time
As we all know the first Thanksgiving meal wasn’t “traditional.” The first Thanksgiving feast didn’t look anything like today’s meal. It included foods like venison, sea bass, cod, clams, lobster, eel, mussels, ground nuts, squashes, beans and berries. They thought that deer meat tasted better than turkey. However, there is some disagreement on whether Pilgrims ate lobsters. Some historians suggest that the Pilgrims refused to eat lobster because they considered the multi-appendaged creatures to be insects.
The pilgrims didn’t use forks, but used a knife, spoon, and their fingers to eat. They shared plates and cups, which led to the spread of disease. The whole meal was purportedly prepared by only four women and two girls. Do you suppose they also did the clean up?
The Mayflower was only one of many 17th-Century ships with that name, and the ship itself was just an ordinary trading vessel. The Plymouth settler’s Mayflower sailed until 1624 before being broken up and recycled into a barn back in England.
When the Pilgrims landed in 1620, Native Americans in the area were already familiar with English: some were escaped slaves, and others had been trading with other settlements. The first Native American to make contact with them, Samoset, asked for beer! The first homes the Pilgrims built were in the style of Native American wigwams, huts built from bark, thatch, and mud.
A Pilgrim woman who reached the age of 25 without being married was considered an “ancient maid”. A father who broke off his daughter’s engagement could be legally sued by the jilted fiancé. Ouch. Young Pilgrim couples courted in the presence of the girl’s family by exchange of endorsements through a long wooden tube known as a “courting stick”.
While sailing 66 days across the Atlantic on the Mayflower, Pilgrims had a limited diet. They ate dried meat and fish, grains and flour, dried fruit, cheese, and hard biscuits. Makes sense. They also avoided drinking water because it was unsafe. You may be surprised to learn that they drank beer instead, even the kids! (Was this party hardy time??) Once they arrived in the new land, they drank fermented apple juice similar to today’s hard apple cider.
So, who were the Pilgrims? When these refugees left England, they were called Pilgrims. Today many call them Separatists. Separatists were people who did not want to obey the king. This group of people was led by a group of pastors who were challenging the authority of the Church. They did this by starting congregations in areas around Scrooby, England.
Two of their members, William Brewster and William Bradford, would go on to have a significant influence over American history. They were leaders in the Plymouth colony. The Plymouth colony turned out to become the first European settlement that was permanent in New England. It also became the first one to use a majority vote.
It is often said that the Plymouth Colony and Jamestown are not connected, but actually, they are. The pilgrims first asked Captain John Smith to be their guide before they left England. After talking to Smith, the pilgrims decided that he was too expensive and that his character was too strong. They were afraid that he would come to dominate the group. After they turned down Smith, the pilgrims invited Myles Standish to be their military consultant and guide. He had never been to North America before. Captain John Smith later helped start Jamestown. He was in charge of it until he got hurt and had to go back home.
On November 9, 1620, the Mayflower saw the scrubby hills of Cape Cod. They traveled along the coast for two days and dropped anchor at today’s Povincetown Harbor in Massachusetts. The men signed a document called the Mayflower Compact. It made them an equal group with just laws so they could all be happy. This agreement became the basis of the government in the Plymouth Colony. Many people today think that this agreement was what made America a democracy.
There were some heroes in the group that came to America. There was John Alden, Priscilla Mullins, and Standish. Also, there was the first European villain in New England. He was hanged for murder. John Goodman’s two dogs, a mastiff, and spaniel, also bounded ashore.
Many people who had Mayflower ancestors would eventually be forgotten. But some of them became famous in American culture and politics. For example, Ulysses S. Grant, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Orson Welles, and Marilyn Monroe.
There is much misinformation about the Pilgrims and some don’t have positive opinions about them. Whatever you think, we owe our version of Turkey Day to them. After all when would we watch football all day with all these goodies to eat?
If you haven’t sampled our Book Discussion group, you missed out on a fun time at the library this week. Denise Reising and Tami Wright put together an excellent entertaining and exciting time. Who knew Lucy was a whiz at the dice? These gals raised quite a ruckus with their impromptu party. Give us a call in January if you would like to be part of a rabble-rousing crowd that loves to read and discuss. So, give Denise and Tami a pat on the back for bringing gambling to the library and instructing the members on how to be criminals.