Christal Cooper – 613
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Rice Cooper
Thanksgiving In Pictures
The Mayflower was a cargo ship about 106 feet long
and 25 feet wide. It traveled about two
miles per hour and covered 3000 miles, two months worth of sailing. The
passengers totaled 102 with 50 men, 20 women, and 32 children.
They were all coming to the New World (America)
to begin new lives. Some came to escape
the religious persecution, and others
came to start a livelihood since England at the time was facing huge
unemployment.
Samoset
was the first Native American Indian to greet the Colonists, and he greeted
them in English, which he was fluent in.
Samoset learned the language from fisherman and other explorers who had
come to the New World years before.
Samoset was described as very tall with long black hair. He stayed with the Colonists for several
days.
The
third time Samoset visited the Colonists, Squanto was by his side. Squanto had been kidnapped by an English
seaman and was sold in Spain to be a slave.
Years later, when he was free, he made his way to England, where he
lived and worked for five years. When he
returned back to his homeland, he found that his entire village, the Patuxet
Tribe, was deserted. Everyone had died
or became members of other tribes in order to survive.
Squanto
taught the Colonists how to survive by planting corn and using dead fish as
fertilizer. He was not always the romanticized, good Native American
Indian. Sometimes he would deliberately
misinterpret conversations where it benefited him the most. His goal was to be an important native
leader. In the end, when he died, he got
his ultimate wish, and the colonists viewed him as “an instrument of God.”
Chief
Massasoit was a powerful leader of the Wampanoag. Chief Massasoit and the Colonists met, and
were able to have a peaceful discussion, with the help of Squanto as
interpreter. Chief Massasoit and the
Colonists signed a treaty together. They
promised to return anything that was stolen, and vowed to defend each other
from enemy attacks.
Edward
Winslow was the leader of the Mayflower.
He served as the governor of Plymouth Colony in 1633, 1636, and
1644. His testimony in Mourt’s
Relation is one of only two primary sources of the “first thanksgiving”
in existence. Below is an excerpt:
"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 among the rest
their greatest king, Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three day 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."
Thanksgiving never became a holiday until
1863 due to the efforts of editor and writer Sarah Hale trying to get
Thanksgiving declared a holiday. It took
her twenty years, pleading of five presidents, before President Abraham Lincoln
finally made the first Thanksgiving holiday in November of 1863.
In
1941, The United States Congress voted to have Thanksgiving holiday a yearly
holiday, the fourth Thursday of the month of November.
Photo Description and Copyright Info
Photo
1.
Mayflower
in Plymouth Harbor. Public Domain.
Photo
2.
Samoset
in the 1850s. Attributed to
Leeback. Public Domain.
Photo
3.
Squanto. Public Domain.
Photo
4.
Statue
of Chief Massasoit. Public Domain.
Photo
5.
Jacket
cover of by Massasoit of the Wampanoags by Alivn G Weeks.
Photo
6.
Edward
Winslow. Public Domain.
Photo
7.
The
First Thanksgiving. Public Domain.
Photo
8.
Sarah
Hale. Public Domain.
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