The Town of Pomeiooc, engraved by Theodor de Bry, plate 19 in Thomas Hariot, A Briefe and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia, London, England, 1590.

CONTENTS

The next
Electronic Field Trip is

Jamestown Unearthed
April 26, 2007

It is little wonder that history has not smiled on the colonists of Jamestown. Though recognized as the first permanent English settlement in North America . . . Jamestown has been largely ignored in colonial lore in favor of Massachusetts’ Plymouth Colony.

But today the banks of the James River are yielding secrets hidden for nearly 400 years that seem to tell a different story. Archaeologists working at the settlement site have turned up what they consider dramatic evidence that the colonists were not ill-prepared dandies and laggards, and that the disaster-plagued Virginia Colony, perhaps more than Plymouth, was the seedbed of the American nation—a bold experiment in democracy, perseverance and enterprise.

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Since 1994, archaeological excavations at the site of the 1607 James Fort have revealed over one million artifacts that are helping archaeologists reconstruct what daily life was like for the English colonists.

Reconstructing the lives of the Native Americans who lived in the region when the English colonists arrived has been particularly difficult. Powhatan Indian houses, tools, and many other objects were made from organic materials which decompose rapidly, significantly reducing the quantity of artifacts available for study. As a result, historians must rely on other primary sources—most of which have a heavy European bias—to understand what daily life was like for the Powhatan Indians.

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Colonial Williamsburg offers a variety of quality instructional materials dealing with 18th-century life, including:

• Hands-On History: American Indian Bandolier Bag (object kit)
• Discovering the Past Through Archaeology (classroom simulation kit)
• Archaeology: Revealing Our History (video and Web materials)
• Archaeology for Young Explorers (book)

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Electronic Field Trips Live in YOUR Classroom!
Join classrooms across the county participating in the 2007–2008 Colonial Williamsburg Electronic Field Trip Series. Explore the new season of engaging, standards-friendly, live television broadcasts, including the Emmy award-winning “No Master Over Me” which airs during Black History Month in February. For more details, see the printable 2007–2008 Electronic Field Trip Schedule.

Equiano Lecture Series Symposium
Come learn, engage, and interact with other educators as scholars present new topics regarding the abolition of the African slave trade. On April 27–28 the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation will present an Equiano Lecture Series Symposium titled “Unifying the Divine and the Secular: The Role of Theology and the Law in the Abolition of the Slave Trade.” This enriching two-day event will examine the moral and legal factors that aided abolitionists in abolishing the slave trade. The lives and activities of key historical figures, such as Thomas Jefferson, Olaudah Equiano, and William Wilberforce, will also be examined. For more details, please visit www.ColonialWilliamsburg.com/Equiano.

—George Percy, Observations Gathered Out of a Discourse of the Plantation of the Southerne Colonie in Virginia by the English, May 30, 1607