FFW (5 min): What did you learn about the Puritans and/or Pilgrims prior to our class? How do you think they are represented in US society?
What do you see?
History is mainly a series of choices and decisions. Some of those decisions are made in how we honor and remember the past. Other decisions are made in the moment, shaping and forming the past as it happens. And everyone we've discussed so far made choices, choices that literally made history. Some of those choices constrained certain people, like the women in Colonial New England we'll learn about today. Other choices had entirely unintended consequences. We live in a world of unintended consequences.
The first English settlers to arrive in New England were the Pilgrims. The Pilgrims were radical. The Pilgrims wanted to separate entirely from the Church of England, which they believe was still far too much like the Catholic Church. The Pilgrims also didn't care about anyone following their lead. They just wanted to do their thing and worship as they pleased. So in 1607, the Pilgrims set out for Holland. America wasn't exactly the Pilgrims' first choice, but the Pilgrims had a problem, a problem parents have been dealing with forever. Teen angst.
The Pilgrims' kids were more interested in assimilating into Dutch culture than keeping the faith. And let's just say the parents weren't too happy with their kids coming home with wooden clogs. Alongside other complaints about Dutch life, in 1620, the Pilgrims packed their bags and set out for the Americas. They leased out a fairly unknown and unimportant boat called the Mayflower to sail across the Atlantic. While on board the Mayflower, the Pilgrims also drafted the Mayflower Compact. Basically, the 41 signers of the Mayflower Compact agreed to create just and equal laws once they got to America. And while their piety might have been on point, their navigation was not. TRANSCRIPT
Reflection: What did we learn today?
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