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On the Waterfront:
Plymouth’s Maritime History
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by Jane L. Port, Curator
Pilgrim Society & Pilgrim Hall Museum |
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An exhibition at
Pilgrim Hall Museum,
On the
Waterfront: Plymouth’s Maritime History
explores the harbor, its
people, and its changing tides
of commerce, shipping, industry and
tourism. |
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Sponsored
by |
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IN
THE BEGINNING: A SUMMER PLACE
The Wampanoag—the
People of the Dawn—called the place by the harbor Patuxet. Each spring
they traveled east along the Nemasket
Trail which led from their inland year-round encampments near today’s
Middleboro and Lake Assawompsett
to the sea to fish, dig clams, catch lobsters, and plant crops of corn and
beans. The harbor and
waterfront had sheltered and supported native communities for thousands of
years before the Mayflower
Pilgrims arrived.
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Squanto (Tisquantum)
L. Gaugen (w. ca 1880–1884), Probably
New England,
about 1880,
Wood, textured paint,
h.17 in., w. 15 ½ in., d. 15 ½ in.,
Pilgrim Society purchase, 1962
(PHM 1277)
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Before the small band of English people came to stay,
English and European ships exploring the North American coast had come and
gone for over a century. They
included Giovanni de Verrazzano in 1524, Samuel de Champlain in 1605, and
John Smith in 1614. Champlain
and Smith mapped the harbor and both befriended and skirmished with native
people. Others brutally
kidnapped native people to sell into slavery or to exhibit as curiosities
in the cities of England and Europe.
Squanto was kidnapped and carried to England.
By the time he found his way home again, diseases carried
unknowingly by immune English and European travelers had infected and
decimated the vulnerable native population of Patuxet. The Pilgrims called the place “New Plymouth” and built
their homes in sight of the harbor.
From that time forward, the history of Plymouth
harbor has reflected both its local story and the broader history of the
United States in countless tales of war and peace, rich trade and hated
embargoes. Its commerce and
industry have grown, adapted and changed through the centuries—fishing,
boatbuilding, iron rolling mills, rope walks, and, finally, tourism.
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