History Paper

History Paper

English people came to New England in the 17th century for a few reasons. Fishing was very much a part of the English economy and the English diet. They learned to make fishing their way to survive. A way to get rich in the colonies, they had to work for it, market it, and sell it. They didn’t keep records of where they were catching fish because they didn’t want everyone to know where the fish were. On Fridays, they ate fish instead of meat. Over time the pilgrims learned to acclimate, or adjust. They would use fish-flakes (wooden racks to smoke, salt, or dry the fish). In front of the state house there is a “sacred cod”, it represents that fisherman showed the way. And the Grasshopper on top of Thaniel Hall means prosperity.

Proprietors were the upper class English people. They had easy access to the crown, and wanted to re establish the feudal system. The Calvert family established Maryland in the 1630s and William Penn was the proprietor of Pennsylvania. The lords were 10% of the population and land ownership was their primary wealth. Serfs paid money to the lords and were 90%. Proprietors can sell land, lease land, and grant rights. John Mason and Sir Fernando Gorges went to Charles I and asked for a grant of land from the Merrimack River to the Piscataquis River, 60 Miles in, but it didn’t work because there was too much land, and too few people. The Mason family owned New Hampshire for 111 years. Mason died in 1635. Gorges then tries to develop it in the 1650s, Mass absorbs most of Masons proprietor. Then in 1677, Mass buys from the Gorges family from the Merrimack River to the Piscataquis River.

The Puritans were powerful political people; they tend to be wealthy and were trying to purify the Anglican Church. There were very few religious nuts. Henry the 8th had a dynasty (an extended family) and translated the Anglican service into English. Beginning in 1529-1530s he makes a set of laws, the political head and religious head. By 1648 he has gone through six wives. The Episcopal Church was all about the heart, senses, and emotion. John Calvin invented Calvinism in the late 16th century, early 17th, and then they leave to Holland.

People that were accepted in “Rogues” Island would not be accepted in Massachusetts. It was a diverse pluralistic or monolithic society. Calvinists were great figures of the Protestant reformation. Predestination meant God is everything, and man is nothing. There were two groups, the saved and the damned. You were given grace, which meant God chose to save you. Ann Hutchinson was an early