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The Puritans in America · Stuff You Should Know

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you should know, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey,
0:11
Speaker 1: and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and Chuck's here
0:13
Speaker 1: and Jerry's here too, and this is stuff you should know.
0:20
Speaker 1: You think that you every time, doesn't it?
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Speaker 2: Oh? Sure? After sixteen years it didn't think much for me.
0:26
Speaker 2: Didn't get a giggle from you.
0:27
Speaker 1: That's good. I like it because it should have gone
0:30
Speaker 1: the opposite.
0:31
Speaker 2: The giggle in me from me because of you, I
0:34
Speaker 2: put a giggle in you. Oh ooh, we about that fresh.
0:40
Speaker 1: Speaking of fresh, Chuck, you probably would not have just
0:44
Speaker 1: said that were you not born an American.
0:48
Speaker 3: Huh.
0:48
Speaker 1: It was America not founded by essentially the most radical element,
0:56
Speaker 1: extremist element that England had to offer at the time.
1:00
Speaker 2: Wow, nice work, look at you.
1:02
Speaker 1: Thanks. That's all we need to say about their backstory.
1:07
Speaker 2: Jerk, Well, I can sum it up in three sentences.
1:11
Speaker 1: Let's hear what you got.
1:14
Speaker 2: Well, we're talking about Puritanism and getting into just you know,
1:20
Speaker 2: English puritanism is a a big ball of wax, very detailed,
1:24
Speaker 2: and it's very easy to get in the weeds. We're
1:26
Speaker 2: going to concentrate more on the Puritans, or at least
1:29
Speaker 2: my charge to Olivia. I was like, you know what,
1:32
Speaker 2: I think it was a Massachusetts at the time when
1:34
Speaker 2: we were doing our show in Medford, and I was like,
1:39
Speaker 2: what's up with this place, Massachusetts? And what was up
1:42
Speaker 2: with the Puritans?
1:43
Speaker 1: Why, like Pilgrims.
1:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, so we're not going to go like super into
1:48
Speaker 2: detail about their formation, but we will talk a little
1:52
Speaker 2: bit about that right now. And my first sentence and
1:56
Speaker 2: then you can just take over is who's a pure
2:00
Speaker 2: the Puritans were And who they were was a group
2:02
Speaker 2: of extreme, far extreme Protestants, and it was a movement
2:09
Speaker 2: that came out of the fact that they were like, hey,
2:12
Speaker 2: England's been reformed the Church of England. We don't want
2:16
Speaker 2: any sniff of Catholicism around anymore. So we're going to
2:21
Speaker 2: go hard, hard, toward the most extreme version of Protestantism
2:26
Speaker 2: that you could imagine.
2:27
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you can make a case that the Puritans
2:29
Speaker 1: would not have existed had England not broken with the
2:32
Speaker 1: Catholic Church informed its own Church of England. Right, But
2:35
Speaker 1: these people are like, no, like, we're not going far enough.
2:38
Speaker 1: We need to just be completely off the rolls, make
2:41
Speaker 1: our own thing. And like you said, like there was
2:44
Speaker 1: this is a thick, thick period of English history from
2:47
Speaker 1: like the fifteen thirties to the sixteen sixties something like that.
2:53
Speaker 1: Like a lot happened during that time, and the Puritans,
2:57
Speaker 1: like they either responded to it or were shaped by
3:00
Speaker 1: it in some way, shape or form. But you can
3:02
Speaker 1: kind of sum the whole thing up is that there
3:03
Speaker 1: was a lot of changing of hands of power from
3:07
Speaker 1: monarchs to people who staged coups, and sometimes the Puritans
3:11
Speaker 1: were deeply persecuted, sometimes brutally. Other times they were the
3:15
Speaker 1: ones in charge and they would brutalize other people. And
3:19
Speaker 1: it was enough that it shook loose some of the
3:23
Speaker 1: more radical groups of Puritans, of Puritans who either wanted
3:29
Speaker 1: to reform the Anglican Church to be more Puritan, or
3:33
Speaker 1: decided the Anglican Church couldn't be reformed and that they
3:35
Speaker 1: should go off and form their own mini churches. It's
3:38
Speaker 1: called congregationalism. So the upshot is things were just in
3:41
Speaker 1: such upheaval that it shook some groups loose. Some moved
3:44
Speaker 1: to Holland, and some ended up moving to North America
3:48
Speaker 1: because stuff was just so crazy back in England at
3:51
Speaker 1: the time.
3:52
Speaker 2: Yeah, they were basically like, hey, we can go over there.
3:55
Speaker 2: This was in sixteen oh eight, and it was a
3:58
Speaker 2: group of separatists. You were talking about these Congregationalists, they
4:01
Speaker 2: were separatists. They wanted to sort of branch off. You know,
4:04
Speaker 2: if you saw the movie The Vivich, remember that one. Yeah,
4:10
Speaker 2: that's kind of what we're talking about. These people that
4:12
Speaker 2: set up their own shops and were like, hey, we
4:15
Speaker 2: can just go out here on our own and be
4:16
Speaker 2: as radically Protestant as we can be, because you know,
4:22
Speaker 2: we're based in Calvinism. We believe in predestination. We think
4:27
Speaker 2: that there are chosen few that are designated to go
4:31
Speaker 2: to heaven, and you're either one of those people or
4:35
Speaker 2: you're not. There's really nothing you can do about that.
4:37
Speaker 2: And we've gotten ministers that are going to decide if
4:40
Speaker 2: you've gone through a real religious conversion or not. And
4:45
Speaker 2: the other thing we should point out too, is that
4:47
Speaker 2: the actual term puritan that didn't come along until the
4:50
Speaker 2: fifteen sixties, and it was like an insult, right it was.
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Speaker 1: I saw it described as I think in the New
4:57
Speaker 1: World Encyclopedia that you could you could considered calling somebody
5:01
Speaker 1: like uptight or high strung, or like just a worry
5:05
Speaker 1: ward or something today. That's kind of what they were
5:09
Speaker 1: calling Puritans back then. The Puritans call themselves sints if
5:12
Speaker 1: that says enough to you about what they thought about themselves.
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Speaker 1: But Puritan was kind of a put down because the people,
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Speaker 1: the other people in the Anglican Church who were like,
5:21
Speaker 1: things are fine, you guys are really nitpicking here. You're
5:25
Speaker 1: up in arms about some really dumb stuff like people
5:28
Speaker 1: burning incense during church services, like just stuff that doesn't matter,
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Speaker 1: and the Puritans were like, it does matter because that
5:37
Speaker 1: is Satan's way of corrupting us.
5:39
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's funny too. One of the other things
5:41
Speaker 2: that keeps coming up, it seems like they really got
5:44
Speaker 2: stuck on, was like can you talk to God directly?
5:47
Speaker 2: Can you pray or not? Or do you have to
5:50
Speaker 2: go through official channels of people higher up in this religion. Yeah,
5:55
Speaker 2: And it seemed like that was a fight, like on
5:58
Speaker 2: and off again for a long time, as people saying like, no,
6:01
Speaker 2: we think you can, like you don't need to be special,
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Speaker 2: you can pray and talk to God, and other people
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Speaker 2: are like, no, that splasts with me, I know.
6:08
Speaker 1: And you just touched on something that's kind of at
6:10
Speaker 1: the heart like this was the great Puritan struggle because
6:13
Speaker 1: one of the reasons for breaking with the Church and
6:15
Speaker 1: getting as far away from is because the Church was like,
6:18
Speaker 1: to get through God, you go through us, Priest, Bishop,
6:21
Speaker 1: cardinal Pope, like, that's the way you go to get
6:24
Speaker 1: to God. You can't do it yourself. You need the church,
6:26
Speaker 1: and by the way, give us a bunch of money.
6:28
Speaker 1: And the Puritans hated that. So they did believe that
6:31
Speaker 1: like a congregation could take care of itself, and that
6:35
Speaker 1: the minister could help people. But really you just needed
6:38
Speaker 1: to know what it said in the Bible and live
6:40
Speaker 1: your life accordingly and hope that you were one of
6:43
Speaker 1: the saved who were going to make it into heaven.
6:46
Speaker 1: That was their whole way. Yet they were also a
6:48
Speaker 1: deeply elitist group, where the wealthier you were, the more
6:54
Speaker 1: that meant you were favored by God, and so by association,
6:59
Speaker 1: if you were poor, were poverty stricken, yeah, that must
7:01
Speaker 1: mean you had some sort of moral failing, right, And
7:04
Speaker 1: if that's not essentially the basis of America till today,
7:08
Speaker 1: I don't know what is.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, it's really funny, well not funny, it's sad, but
7:13
Speaker 2: you know what.
7:14
Speaker 1: I mean, I know exactly what to me.
7:17
Speaker 2: So I mentioned the group of separatists that in sixteen
7:20
Speaker 2: oh eight they came from a village in Yorkshire called Screwby.
7:24
Speaker 2: You mentioned they moved to Holland, and then about twelve
7:27
Speaker 2: years later a little more than one hundred of them
7:30
Speaker 2: went to Plymouth Rock and founded that colony here in
7:33
Speaker 2: North America. And again with the idea they're going to
7:36
Speaker 2: create this great community where they can be English, they
7:40
Speaker 2: don't have to compromise what they believe in. These were
7:44
Speaker 2: the people in the Mayflower who a lot of them died.
7:47
Speaker 2: They had that first Thanksgiving. I didn't have Christmas though, right.
7:52
Speaker 1: No, the Puritans hated Christmas.
7:54
Speaker 2: They did.
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Speaker 1: They didn't like I always thought it was because I
7:58
Speaker 1: saw somebody explain it that it's not in the Bible.
8:00
Speaker 1: If it wasn't in the Bible, it was Satanic, right,
8:03
Speaker 1: And so of course they didn't mention Christmas in the Bible.
8:06
Speaker 1: But I also saw a more reasonable explanation is that
8:09
Speaker 1: I think we talked about this Christmas at the time
8:12
Speaker 1: was a drunken, rabble rousing occasion where almost like you know,
8:17
Speaker 1: Halloween can get to be like today. That's kind of
8:20
Speaker 1: what Christmas was like, so, of course they hated Christmas.
8:23
Speaker 2: Yeah, because no one drinks around Christmas now.
8:26
Speaker 1: No everybody observes it puritanically.
8:31
Speaker 2: In sixteen thirty, if we jump ahead just a little bit,
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Speaker 2: this is when and this is the sort of the
8:35
Speaker 2: money stuff I was after. This is when the Massachusetts
8:38
Speaker 2: Bay Colony was founded. It was another group from England
8:42
Speaker 2: led by a guy named John Winthrop, who was kind
8:45
Speaker 2: of a well heeled attorney. He was a gentry member,
8:50
Speaker 2: which means he was sort of just below nobility, but
8:52
Speaker 2: you know, very highly respected class of people, which you know,
8:57
Speaker 2: as you'll see, comes like you were saying, comes to
8:59
Speaker 2: be thing that the Puritans were known for. And when
9:03
Speaker 2: we think about Puritans in this country generally, we're thinking
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Speaker 2: about the people that came over with John Winthrop the
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Speaker 2: founding of Massachusetts, not the Pilgrims, not separatists, because they
9:17
Speaker 2: weren't like, hey, we don't want anything to do with
9:19
Speaker 2: the Church of England, but they were still Congregationalists.
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Speaker 1: Yeah. So, yes, the Puritans and the Pilgrims were for
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Speaker 1: all intentsive purposes, separate groups. They lived separately. They were
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Speaker 1: both They were both reformists, Calvinists who wanted the Anglican
9:34
Speaker 1: Church to either get further away from Catholicism or split
9:38
Speaker 1: from the Anglican Church altogether. So the best way the
9:41
Speaker 1: rule thumb to understand both groups is the Pilgrims would
9:45
Speaker 1: have found the Puritans ungodly and satan like. That's how
9:50
Speaker 1: radical the Pilgrims were. The most radical of all of
9:54
Speaker 1: the separatists, or of all of the reformists of the
9:58
Speaker 1: Anglican Church. Ts were definitely they would look down on
10:02
Speaker 1: us today. The Pilgrims would have just run in terror
10:05
Speaker 1: if they saw any of us today. The pure Tins
10:07
Speaker 1: would just look down on us, and they would recognize
10:10
Speaker 1: it themselves in us, I think.
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Speaker 2: A little right too. Yeah, totally, yeah, And we'll get
10:14
Speaker 2: to some of that a little bit later. But the
10:17
Speaker 2: other thing is that they had a lot more money
10:20
Speaker 2: than the Pilgrims did. They had a lot more financing
10:22
Speaker 2: and resources. There were also about ten times as many,
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Speaker 2: think about a thousand people came over in that first group,
10:29
Speaker 2: and they weren't they were just looking to set up
10:31
Speaker 2: an idealize society over there. They weren't like fleeing England
10:34
Speaker 2: or anything. But they were also they didn't want like
10:39
Speaker 2: freedom of religion. At the same time, they were still
10:41
Speaker 2: like super puritanical. But Winthrop, you know, you've heard the
10:44
Speaker 2: very famous sermon about the colony being the city on
10:48
Speaker 2: the hill. That was from Winthrop when he was talking about,
10:52
Speaker 2: you know, metaphorically, we're who everyone's going to look up to.
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Speaker 2: So we got to set a good example and lead
10:58
Speaker 2: really godlike lives.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, we don't want this thing to fail because everybody's
11:02
Speaker 1: watching us, so better act like Puritans essentially exactly. And
11:07
Speaker 1: one of the ways they did that also is that
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Speaker 1: they would all keep a close eye on one another.
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Speaker 1: Because there's one other thing to to understand about the Puritans.
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Speaker 1: They believed, quite literally, Satan was walking among us and
11:20
Speaker 1: took an active interest in each individual's vices, desires, all
11:26
Speaker 1: that stuff. And if you were weak, if you didn't
11:28
Speaker 1: have your guard up at all times and live a
11:30
Speaker 1: very godly life, you could be corrupted and God would
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Speaker 1: kill you and send your send your soul to hell.
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Speaker 1: That was the stakes of what these Puritans were living
11:40
Speaker 1: with on a daily basis. So the best way to
11:43
Speaker 1: root out Satan before he can really get a foothold
11:45
Speaker 1: in a colony is to watch everybody down to the
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Speaker 1: family level. Family members would watch each other for signs
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Speaker 1: that Satan was corrupting them.
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Speaker 2: Well, that's the vivit.
11:55
Speaker 1: Yeah exactly. That definitely is portrayed in that for sure.
11:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, don't turn your back on that. Billy goat.
12:03
Speaker 1: Fun time, Joseph for something.
12:06
Speaker 2: No, what was it? Something black, Freddie Fosblayer, fun time Black,
12:12
Speaker 2: I don't know, something like that. These are the moments
12:15
Speaker 2: where people are screaming at it's in their cars or whatever.
12:19
Speaker 1: Apparently it's anecdotally. What do you mean, don't you remember?
12:23
Speaker 1: I think there was a listener mail that Kate, you
12:25
Speaker 1: were trying to think of a word, and it was anecdotal.
12:27
Speaker 2: Oh oh yeah, yeah, I gotcha. I think maybe before
12:33
Speaker 2: we break, we'll just say this that we also have
12:36
Speaker 2: to talk about the finances of this. It was it
12:39
Speaker 2: was a Puritanical group and it was all about religion,
12:43
Speaker 2: but they also had to make money. So technically the
12:45
Speaker 2: colony was founded by a company, the Massachusetts Bay Company,
12:49
Speaker 2: which was a stock venture that traded fur. They traded fish,
12:55
Speaker 2: and they had shareholders and it was you know, it
12:58
Speaker 2: was a business.
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Speaker 1: It was, but this is how the Puritans retained control
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Speaker 1: of it. The joint owners, the joint stockholders of that
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Speaker 1: company were the ones who voted on who ran things
13:10
Speaker 1: in the colony. But it just so happens that the
13:13
Speaker 1: owners of the stock were exclusively people who lived in
13:16
Speaker 1: that colony. All of those people were Puritans, and so
13:19
Speaker 1: they were able to keep the dream alive of this
13:23
Speaker 1: city on a hill because they held complete power over
13:27
Speaker 1: this company and all of its doings.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, they were the voting shareholders.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, but it is important to remember too they ran
13:34
Speaker 1: a successful company. Because we're elitist. They were elitist religious people.
13:42
Speaker 1: It's very it's I want to say it's bizarre, but
13:44
Speaker 1: it's not at all bizarre. It's very common, I think.
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Speaker 2: Actually, yeah, all right, so let's take that break and
13:52
Speaker 2: we'll talk about what life was like there in Massachusetts
13:56
Speaker 2: early on, right after this.
14:22
Speaker 1: So when the people first arrived in Massachusetts, when the
14:29
Speaker 1: settlers that were led by John Winthrop, they hit Salem first,
14:33
Speaker 1: they met with some people who had kind of spread
14:36
Speaker 1: out from Plymouth, and they were like, you guys are
14:39
Speaker 1: a little too high strung even for us, So we're
14:42
Speaker 1: gonna go found Boston, which apparently is named after a
14:45
Speaker 1: town in Lincolnshire, in England, where a lot of the
14:48
Speaker 1: people were from, and Winthrop was. They were like, you're
14:51
Speaker 1: the governor. You're the guy you let us over here.
14:53
Speaker 1: You gave a great lay sermon. No one's ever heard
14:56
Speaker 1: anything better than what you just said. In fact, so
14:58
Speaker 1: why don't you become governor? And he kept getting elected
15:01
Speaker 1: and re elected and reelected because they had annual elections.
15:04
Speaker 1: It wasn't every like two or four years, but even
15:07
Speaker 1: still he was like, hey, guys, I think somebody else
15:10
Speaker 1: should take a turn too. I don't want to accidentally
15:12
Speaker 1: become king of the Massachusetts Bay Company, you know.
15:16
Speaker 2: Yeah, which was I don't know, maybe a little bit surprising.
15:20
Speaker 1: It was. But another thing that's surprising too is these
15:22
Speaker 1: people are immediately removed from England, where there is a
15:28
Speaker 1: monarch in charge, the king, that has absolute authority over
15:32
Speaker 1: there in their lives, and these guys are holding annual
15:35
Speaker 1: elections for their leader who directly helps them run their
15:40
Speaker 1: own town. That's bizarre. But that's also the seating of
15:44
Speaker 1: American democracy too.
15:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, which I'm sure they it was pretty radical
15:49
Speaker 2: for them at the time. All Right, So they are Massachusetts.
15:54
Speaker 2: They're farming, nothing huge, but they're farming, they're fishing, they're
15:59
Speaker 2: milling life, they're building boats and ships. The population is
16:04
Speaker 2: really really growing kind of all over New England at
16:07
Speaker 2: that time, because they just started spreading out. They would
16:09
Speaker 2: go found another town, then another town. Let's go to
16:12
Speaker 2: Rhode Island, let's go to Maine, and they said, what
16:14
Speaker 2: are those places even They said, well, we'll come up
16:16
Speaker 2: with the names later. But follow was in the seaside, lovely. Yeah,
16:19
Speaker 2: just come this way and if you were a one
16:24
Speaker 2: of the first people there, you were known as a proprietor.
16:27
Speaker 2: You would get a little bit of land. The religion
16:30
Speaker 2: again was still central to all this stuff in every
16:34
Speaker 2: town that they were still you know, laser focused on that.
16:37
Speaker 2: But it was really really growing fast. And one of
16:41
Speaker 2: the reasons was because King Charles the First dissolved parliament
16:46
Speaker 2: in sixteen twenty nine. So all these Puritan reformers who
16:50
Speaker 2: were working in England to try and change the state
16:53
Speaker 2: of the church there had no like a recourse. They
16:57
Speaker 2: were like, well, we've been kicked out of Parliament, so
16:59
Speaker 2: let's go to this new world, I guess. And about
17:02
Speaker 2: twenty thousand of them moved there between sixteen twenty nine
17:06
Speaker 2: and sixteen forty when Parliament got back together.
17:09
Speaker 1: I know, in a decade their numbers grew about twenty
17:13
Speaker 1: four give flux of people. Yeah yeah. And in that
17:16
Speaker 1: twenty year period there was like there a lot happened
17:20
Speaker 1: in England as well. And that was also not just
17:23
Speaker 1: the reason why a bunch of Puritans showed up, because
17:26
Speaker 1: there was you know, the monarchy was toppled and there
17:29
Speaker 1: was civil war and all that, but that also led
17:32
Speaker 1: to the fleeing essentially from the UK of well it
17:36
Speaker 1: was in the UK at the time, but the Scottish,
17:38
Speaker 1: the Irish, other English World Puritans, French immigrants, they all
17:45
Speaker 1: showed up and they were like, hey, stuff really off
17:48
Speaker 1: chain back in England, and you know what will eventually
17:53
Speaker 1: be the UK. So we're going to come here and
17:56
Speaker 1: hang out with you guys, but we're not Puritans, so
17:58
Speaker 1: don't put that stuff on us. You keep your hang
18:00
Speaker 1: ups to yourself. And the Puritans kind of scratched their
18:05
Speaker 1: van Dyke beards for a second and they said, you
18:08
Speaker 1: know what, you look like somebody who could make me
18:10
Speaker 1: a lot of money. Welcome aboard. And so Massachusetts grew
18:14
Speaker 1: not just spiritually when all of the other Puritans showed up.
18:17
Speaker 1: But economically it really started to make inroads because a
18:21
Speaker 1: lot of labors showed up, a lot of craftsmen showed up,
18:26
Speaker 1: and merchants showed up too, who were like, Hey, I've
18:28
Speaker 1: got connections back in England that can get a stuff
18:31
Speaker 1: we need or who will buy the stuff that we're making,
18:34
Speaker 1: and it started to thrive pretty quickly.
18:36
Speaker 2: Around that time, they also scratched their Vandyke beards and said,
18:39
Speaker 2: wait a minute, we thought off the chainment that was good.
18:44
Speaker 2: I guess just shut up. Don't say anything about that.
18:47
Speaker 1: At least I didn't say off the hook. They would
18:49
Speaker 1: have been like, what are you talking.
18:50
Speaker 2: Exactly like people remain on hooks. So while this is
18:56
Speaker 2: going on, let's say this is what sixteen thirty six,
19:01
Speaker 2: the colony of Connecticut was founded by a guy named
19:04
Speaker 2: John Hooker. He was a pastor and what would later
19:08
Speaker 2: be Cambridge. But he got a commission from the General
19:11
Speaker 2: Court of Massachusetts go found Connecticut. So that happened, and
19:16
Speaker 2: then Rhode Island. There were actually Puritan dissidents that founded
19:20
Speaker 2: Rhode Island, and basically every part of New England was
19:25
Speaker 2: founded under some sort of religious pretense, except for New Hampshire,
19:30
Speaker 2: which is kind of interesting I think, like I think
19:33
Speaker 2: you can still see remnants of that stuff today and
19:37
Speaker 2: how New England is.
19:38
Speaker 1: Yeah, like I think the New Hampshire state license plate
19:42
Speaker 1: says Satan's country, right, actually says live free or die.
19:49
Speaker 2: Oh well, yeah, there you have it.
19:51
Speaker 1: So this whole venture is starting to really kind of cook.
19:56
Speaker 1: Between sixteen thirty and before the sixteen hundreds were out,
20:00
Speaker 1: it just really established itself. They were spreading out so
20:03
Speaker 1: much like you said, they were founding new colonies that
20:05
Speaker 1: were seeded from the original Massachusetts Bay colonies. The Pilgrims
20:10
Speaker 1: were like, nobody likes us, No one's joining our ranks.
20:14
Speaker 1: We're actually losing people now. Yeah, we had the first
20:17
Speaker 1: murder among Europeans in North America. Here can we come
20:22
Speaker 1: join you? And actually there's a big, big argument in
20:25
Speaker 1: a debate and a schism I think in Plymouth who
20:29
Speaker 1: like the practical leaders were like, guys, we're not gonna
20:32
Speaker 1: make it unless we join up with Massachusetts.
20:34
Speaker 2: Yeah.
20:35
Speaker 1: The other ones were like they're not godly enough. And
20:37
Speaker 1: I think the people who thought they weren't godly enough
20:39
Speaker 1: lost out, and so Plymouth was taken into is absorbed
20:43
Speaker 1: into Massachusetts in sixteen ninety one.
20:46
Speaker 2: That's right. So we talked a little bit about what
20:51
Speaker 2: was going on there as far as the kind of
20:53
Speaker 2: things they were doing, fishing and lumbering and farming a
20:56
Speaker 2: little bit. But like day to day life, the two
21:00
Speaker 2: most important things were going to church and going to school.
21:05
Speaker 2: If there's one thing we can credit Puritanism with is
21:08
Speaker 2: the fact that they put a lot of weight and
21:12
Speaker 2: importance on schooling everybody and making sure everybody could read,
21:17
Speaker 2: so everybody could read the Bible.
21:20
Speaker 1: That's another legacy of Puritans that's still around today and
21:24
Speaker 1: that's super American. Is public Educationah, like a very extensive
21:30
Speaker 1: government overseen like educational system. That's what the Puritans set up.
21:35
Speaker 1: They actually passed an act, the Old Diluter Satan Act, Yeah,
21:41
Speaker 1: of sixteen forty seven, which I looked it up. I
21:44
Speaker 1: couldn't find that it was ever repealed, so it's technically
21:47
Speaker 1: still on the books in Relachusetts. Yeah. But it basically said,
21:51
Speaker 1: if you have a town of fifty families, up to
21:54
Speaker 1: fifty families, you have to hire a school master. That's
21:57
Speaker 1: just law. Now, if you have one hundred families or more,
22:00
Speaker 1: you have to actually build your own grammar school. And
22:04
Speaker 1: if you're the head of household, not only do your
22:07
Speaker 1: kids have to go to school, you have to make
22:08
Speaker 1: sure that your servants' kids are educated too.
22:11
Speaker 2: That's right, little kids. What would be like, I guess
22:15
Speaker 2: sort of kindergarten to first grade. Second grade ed age
22:20
Speaker 2: would go to what was called a dame school. Usually
22:22
Speaker 2: an older woman of the community would run that one.
22:25
Speaker 2: Then they had the secondary schools. If you were from
22:28
Speaker 2: a wealthier family, you would go there to learn stuff
22:30
Speaker 2: to prepare you for more education. And if you're like,
22:33
Speaker 2: what are you talking about more education, this is sixteen
22:36
Speaker 2: thirty six, guys. We're talking about a little college called
22:41
Speaker 2: Haavid because in sixteen thirty six some leaders in the
22:46
Speaker 2: Puritan community established the college to educate the clergy there,
22:51
Speaker 2: and it was renamed Harvard a few years after that
22:54
Speaker 2: after Puritan minister John Harvard, after he said, Hey, I
22:58
Speaker 2: got a lot of land here, I have a valuable estate,
23:01
Speaker 2: I have this incredible library. It's all yours, And so
23:05
Speaker 2: they named the college Harvard, and eventually that town would
23:08
Speaker 2: become Cambridge.
23:10
Speaker 1: Yes, so, yeah, they named it Cambridge because John Harvard
23:14
Speaker 1: and a lot of the other leaders had gone to
23:15
Speaker 1: school at Cambridge, which was producing clergy as well. So
23:20
Speaker 1: that's pretty interesting. And I've noticed before on Harvard's little
23:22
Speaker 1: logo it does say sixteen thirty six, and that's quite
23:25
Speaker 1: a claim to fame. In the United States, I've noticed
23:28
Speaker 1: that not a lot of things go back to sixteen
23:31
Speaker 1: thirty six in the US. So hats off to Harvard,
23:34
Speaker 1: as they say, as they say in the Dame Schools.
23:39
Speaker 2: Not hats off to Harper. No, led Zeppelin wasn't.
23:44
Speaker 1: That Oh yeah, yeah, that's right, that's the one that
23:46
Speaker 1: starts out so weird.
23:48
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was a weird song, good one. So all right,
23:54
Speaker 2: like we kind of beat around the bush a little
23:56
Speaker 2: bit about who the like, how pure channical they were.
23:59
Speaker 2: You you say that a Pilgrim would look at a
24:01
Speaker 2: Puritan like they were like a modern day American, you know,
24:05
Speaker 2: or something like that. Yeah, in our modern eyes, we
24:10
Speaker 2: think the Puritans were just really you know, like you said,
24:13
Speaker 2: the the derogatory name, they were uptight, they didn't have
24:16
Speaker 2: any fun, they were dour, but that that's really not
24:19
Speaker 2: necessarily true. That's kind of the popular trope in the
24:22
Speaker 2: media portrayal. But they had it was all about money,
24:27
Speaker 2: like Once people started making money and there was class division,
24:32
Speaker 2: they were people wanted to show it off, and they
24:34
Speaker 2: were like, all right, well, let's let's pass some laws
24:37
Speaker 2: here that says, you know, you don't have to wear
24:39
Speaker 2: gray and black all the time. You can. You can
24:42
Speaker 2: splash a little color on your house and on your clothing,
24:45
Speaker 2: and you can. You can wear those things that you
24:47
Speaker 2: can afford to buy and show them off a little bit.
24:50
Speaker 1: Yeah, why shouldn't you show if your k new Cadillac buggy,
24:53
Speaker 1: that shows that God clearly favors you over your neighbors.
24:57
Speaker 1: Exactly should, but only if you an economic or social elite.
25:02
Speaker 1: If you're not, if you're a peasant, or you're just
25:05
Speaker 1: not favored by God, you have to dress in those
25:07
Speaker 1: great clothes that we used to all have to wear. Yeah,
25:10
Speaker 1: that was a big change, and that happened in just
25:12
Speaker 1: a couple of decades. What about sex?
25:16
Speaker 2: Is that sex?
25:19
Speaker 1: Oh? My god? So they did not like extramarital sex.
25:24
Speaker 1: They were not big fans of same sex relationships.
25:27
Speaker 2: Nope.
25:28
Speaker 1: They didn't even like masturbation. So you'd think, of course, like,
25:33
Speaker 1: I mean, they're famous for the scarlet letter. These are
25:35
Speaker 1: the people who branded hester Prynne with the scarlet letter.
25:38
Speaker 1: At least we put it on our clothing, right, Yes,
25:41
Speaker 1: they did. That was a real thing. Nathaniel Hawthorne did
25:44
Speaker 1: not lie. But I think as a modern group we've
25:48
Speaker 1: kind of extrapolated that to mean that they did not
25:50
Speaker 1: like sex at all. Like you, they would just be
25:53
Speaker 1: like some guy who followed people around and like hit
25:55
Speaker 1: him with the switch whenever they thought about sex or something.
25:58
Speaker 1: That's actually the opposite of what they were.
26:00
Speaker 2: Like, yeah, apparently you were if you were married. They
26:04
Speaker 2: were like, hey, you go make kids, and even if
26:07
Speaker 2: you're not making kids, you go and do that dirty deed.
26:12
Speaker 2: I believe the the quote was it would bond couples
26:15
Speaker 2: together with good will and delight. And they talked about
26:19
Speaker 2: the duty of desire to like not withhold sex from
26:22
Speaker 2: your partner, and they would even turn a blind eye
26:25
Speaker 2: to premaral sex with his which is really shocking to
26:28
Speaker 2: hear this, but they'd be like, hey, if you're in there,
26:31
Speaker 2: you're not married yet, don't worry about it. Do your thing,
26:34
Speaker 2: but if you get pregnant, you better get married really
26:37
Speaker 2: quickly and not tell everyone that this happened first exactly.
26:41
Speaker 1: So that was a big one. I didn't know that
26:43
Speaker 1: that they were into sex.
26:45
Speaker 2: Did not know that or the drinking thing either.
26:47
Speaker 1: No, that's another thing too. You would think that they
26:49
Speaker 1: were all teetotalers, and they were not. In fact, they
26:53
Speaker 1: drank about twice as much as we drink, yeah, by
26:58
Speaker 1: gallons of alcohol pure alcoholic, which apparently is how they
27:01
Speaker 1: measure drinking over the years, right. Yeah, So they would
27:06
Speaker 1: drink all day long, morning, noon, night. They drank the
27:10
Speaker 1: entire time, but you had to hold your liquor because
27:14
Speaker 1: being drunk was not okay, And I don't think it
27:17
Speaker 1: was like something they would execute you for, but it
27:19
Speaker 1: was very much frowned upon. But drinking. Go ahead and
27:22
Speaker 1: drink all day long, keep a nice little buzz going.
27:24
Speaker 1: But that's it.
27:25
Speaker 2: Yeah, I get the feeling. I get the feeling. You
27:28
Speaker 2: had to be pretty drunk to get that scorn. Okay,
27:32
Speaker 2: So I like you had to really cross the line,
27:35
Speaker 2: right exactly. But I think it was hard for them
27:38
Speaker 2: because they could hold their liquor. Yeah.
27:40
Speaker 1: So in seventeen ninety, the average American drank and estimated
27:45
Speaker 1: six gallons of pure alcohol per year. That's seventeen ninety.
27:51
Speaker 1: We're thinking that probably did not change much like go
27:54
Speaker 1: up or down from one hundred or so years before that,
27:58
Speaker 1: it started to go down in the nineteenth century, right,
28:01
Speaker 1: So six gallons Today, in twenty twenty one, the average
28:05
Speaker 1: American drinks two point eighty three gallons of pure alcohol year,
28:09
Speaker 1: so twice as much the Puritans were drinking than we do.
28:13
Speaker 2: Wow, have being premarital sex. They're drinking all day long. Yep,
28:17
Speaker 2: no wonder, they're having premarital sex. They're drinking all day long.
28:21
Speaker 1: Sure, what else are you going to do?
28:22
Speaker 2: Yeah? Exactly. So when it comes to the women in
28:27
Speaker 2: these societies, it was a patriarch like there's no getting
28:31
Speaker 2: around that. And women didn't have a lot of legal
28:34
Speaker 2: rights at the time, no getting around that. But depending
28:37
Speaker 2: on which congregation or which community you were in, there
28:40
Speaker 2: may be women in that town that had more say
28:44
Speaker 2: over others in what was important in that town, which
28:48
Speaker 2: was the church, which was what was being preached, the
28:52
Speaker 2: sermons that the children were hearing. Sometimes they would even
28:55
Speaker 2: be able to lead those sermons, which was pretty.
28:56
Speaker 1: Radical for the time, right, Yeah, for sure, And I
29:00
Speaker 1: mean like it was very patriarchical, but I read that
29:03
Speaker 1: the Puritans did have respect, especially colonial Puritans in New
29:07
Speaker 1: England had a lot of respect for women for their
29:10
Speaker 1: domestic abilities.
29:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, because they.
29:12
Speaker 1: Did a lot of stuff just to keep a homegoing,
29:16
Speaker 1: and then also because they would go through childbirth. So
29:19
Speaker 1: like there was a lot of respect for women in
29:21
Speaker 1: that sense. But the men or the oldest son were
29:25
Speaker 1: clearly the head of the household.
29:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, of course, yeah, they and then that we talked
29:32
Speaker 2: about this in our Salem Witch Trials episode. But you know,
29:36
Speaker 2: the reason that was such a big deal is because
29:39
Speaker 2: it was a big deal. It wasn't. The idea that
29:41
Speaker 2: the Puritans were all over the place trying to drown
29:44
Speaker 2: and burn witches just wasn't true. Salem was a pretty
29:49
Speaker 2: exceptional incident even for the time. It was a big
29:53
Speaker 2: controversial thing and a pretty unusual thing. So if you
29:56
Speaker 2: have it in your head that Puritans were just like,
29:59
Speaker 2: you know, there's wait burner, it really wasn't like that.
30:03
Speaker 1: No, no, no, it was Remember I think we talked
30:05
Speaker 1: a lot like Salem was super isolated. Yeah, because they
30:08
Speaker 1: were the most puritanical and the most dour, and they
30:13
Speaker 1: just kind of cracked. I think, if I remember correctly,
30:15
Speaker 1: that was a good episode. Yeah, was that a two parter?
30:19
Speaker 2: I don't remember.
30:21
Speaker 1: I don't either. It was a good episode or episodes.
30:24
Speaker 1: That's right, you want to take.
30:26
Speaker 2: A break, Yeah, let's take a break.
30:30
Speaker 1: Okay, we're gonna take a break.
30:32
Speaker 2: All right, let's do it, all.
30:33
Speaker 1: Right, softy jaw.
30:41
Speaker 3: Soft all right.
31:02
Speaker 2: So here's the deal. If you were in one of
31:06
Speaker 2: the puritanical communities, they did not like people who went
31:12
Speaker 2: up against them too hard. If you went up against
31:15
Speaker 2: them too hard and we're a little too outspoken about
31:17
Speaker 2: how things were being done, you probably found yourself leaving
31:22
Speaker 2: and being ousted. And a couple of pretty notable people
31:26
Speaker 2: that happened to was a guy named Roger Williams and
31:28
Speaker 2: a woman named Anne Hutchison. Williams was a minister. He
31:33
Speaker 2: was educated in Cambridge, not the American Cambridge.
31:39
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, that's what they call that town.
31:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, the American Cambridge, New Cambridge. He came to Boston
31:45
Speaker 2: in sixteen thirty one, moved around a bit. He seemed
31:48
Speaker 2: to be a little bit of a rabble rouser. He
31:50
Speaker 2: wasn't sort of content to just put his head down
31:53
Speaker 2: and go along with everything everyone said. And that was
31:56
Speaker 2: a problem. That was a big problem at the time. Actually,
32:00
Speaker 2: when it came to how they were their approach to
32:03
Speaker 2: dealing with the local indigenous Native American population.
32:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, he was kind of an idealized Puritan. He believed
32:10
Speaker 1: in the separation of church and state, which is something
32:13
Speaker 1: that Puritans are either credited with establishing in America or
32:18
Speaker 1: are criticized for not having done. It just depends on
32:21
Speaker 1: which article you're reading at the time, right, But he
32:24
Speaker 1: was definitely in favor of the separation of church and state.
32:27
Speaker 1: And he also was in favor of treating the Native
32:30
Speaker 1: Americans who they shared this area with respectfully, not just
32:34
Speaker 1: taking their land because the crown said they could, but
32:36
Speaker 1: like negotiating with them, like dealing with them fairly, to
32:40
Speaker 1: like purchase land, and in fact he did. He purchased
32:43
Speaker 1: a large tract of land from the Narraganset I think,
32:46
Speaker 1: and ended up founding Rhode Island. Those are I mean,
32:49
Speaker 1: Rhode Island's a small state, but it's a pretty big
32:50
Speaker 1: tract of land in general.
32:53
Speaker 2: Huge tract of plant m But Rhode Island was open
32:57
Speaker 2: for business. They were like, Hey, if you're a Quaker,
32:59
Speaker 2: come on over. If you're a Baptist or an Anabaptist,
33:02
Speaker 2: come on over.
33:03
Speaker 1: You want to learn design come on over.
33:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, basically, anyone who wasn't a Puritan was welcome there.
33:11
Speaker 2: They weren't welcome in Massachusetts. He himself converted in sixteen
33:16
Speaker 2: thirty nine to Baptism, and the very first Baptist church
33:19
Speaker 2: in America is right there or I'm not sure if
33:22
Speaker 2: still they're not actually, but right there in Providence.
33:25
Speaker 1: I don't think they tear stuff down in Providence, so
33:27
Speaker 1: it's probably like everything that Lovecraft wrote about is basically
33:33
Speaker 1: still there.
33:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a sign there that says Providence first Baptist
33:37
Speaker 2: and then in parentheses, No, really first Baptist.
33:40
Speaker 1: Right.
33:41
Speaker 2: Yeah.
33:42
Speaker 1: So the other person you mentioned was Ann Hutchinson, and
33:45
Speaker 1: there were also tons of dissenters, but these two are
33:47
Speaker 1: the famous, most famous, I should say. And Anne Hutchinson
33:51
Speaker 1: is very famous because she was about as outspoken as
33:55
Speaker 1: a person could get, not just in her time, but
33:58
Speaker 1: in any time, Like she just did not take any guff.
34:01
Speaker 1: She was an incredibly intelligent and compassionate midwife, and she
34:06
Speaker 1: had some sort of holy conversion herself. Like if anybody
34:12
Speaker 1: went through a conversion, it was probably Anne Hutchinson. But
34:15
Speaker 1: she started out as a follower of the minister John Cotton,
34:18
Speaker 1: who was the father in law of Increased Mather, grandfather
34:21
Speaker 1: of Cotton Mather, and initially John Cotton had to flee
34:25
Speaker 1: England because he was being persecuted for his beliefs. But
34:29
Speaker 1: then as Anne Hutchinson kind of broke with him and
34:31
Speaker 1: became a little more of a firebrand and a dissident,
34:35
Speaker 1: he ended up turning on her with John Winthrop and
34:39
Speaker 1: she was ostracized. She was excommunicated from Massachusetts for behaving
34:44
Speaker 1: in a manner not comely for her sex. That was
34:47
Speaker 1: a quote, if you've never really heard me talk before,
34:49
Speaker 1: I don't talk like that.
34:52
Speaker 2: I've known you for a long time, never heard you
34:54
Speaker 2: say the word comely until just now.
34:56
Speaker 1: Yeah.
34:57
Speaker 2: So she was actually preaching like you, Sa said. She
35:00
Speaker 2: went through that conversion and she was preaching the Holy Spirit,
35:04
Speaker 2: and she was saying she was one of those people
35:07
Speaker 2: that were like, hey, you get a direct line to
35:11
Speaker 2: God in the Holy Spirit. You can talk to God,
35:14
Speaker 2: and anyone can get this personal connection to God. Anyone
35:17
Speaker 2: can go to Heaven. It doesn't matter if you're a sinner,
35:20
Speaker 2: it doesn't matter what kind of a relationship you have
35:23
Speaker 2: with the church. It's it's a personal and this is
35:26
Speaker 2: what you know, I got growing up with what the
35:29
Speaker 2: Baptists really think about these days. Well, and I guess
35:31
Speaker 2: all along was that it's a very personal relationship you
35:34
Speaker 2: have with God. You don't need to go to a
35:39
Speaker 2: church even necessarily. You just have that personal relationship and
35:44
Speaker 2: you can pray directly to God. You got an open line.
35:46
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a very Protestant way of looking at things.
35:49
Speaker 1: It's like the antithesis of the Catholic way again. Yeah,
35:53
Speaker 1: but Ann Hutchinson, she was basically like, you can, you
35:57
Speaker 1: can banish me, but God's going to destroy this colony.
36:00
Speaker 2: Famous quote.
36:01
Speaker 1: Yeah, her famous quote was we're on a mission from.
36:03
Speaker 2: God, yeah, exactly.
36:07
Speaker 1: And it didn't come to pass. Massachusetts is still there.
36:09
Speaker 1: But she went off and just kind of did her
36:11
Speaker 1: own thing, and her family moved with her to Rhode Island.
36:15
Speaker 1: Apparently her husband was extremely supportive and she was the
36:19
Speaker 1: mother of fifteen, if not sixteen kids, and they all
36:22
Speaker 1: moved to Rhode Island and Roger Williams said, welcome on in.
36:26
Speaker 1: He said, why are you wearing sunglasses? It's nighttime?
36:28
Speaker 2: Fifteen kids. That was good. Some other people, if you
36:34
Speaker 2: want to talk about people that Massachusetts didn't want a round.
36:37
Speaker 2: That was the Quakers. The Puritans didn't like them because
36:41
Speaker 2: the Quakers were just too like, probably a little too
36:44
Speaker 2: hippy dippy for them. They were all about following your
36:47
Speaker 2: inner light again, having a direct line to Jesus, didn't
36:51
Speaker 2: need religious officials. They thought the Quakers were weird, so
36:55
Speaker 2: the Massachusetts colonies were like, we don't want you around here.
37:00
Speaker 2: Sometimes it would get violent and ugly. I believe over
37:03
Speaker 2: the course of a couple of years, four Quakers were hanged,
37:07
Speaker 2: one of which was Mary Dyer. She was one of
37:10
Speaker 2: the acolytes of Anne Hutchinson, who had, you know, eventually
37:14
Speaker 2: obviously converted to Quakerism. But you know, things got so
37:18
Speaker 2: bad among persecuting Quakers that King Charles the Second in
37:22
Speaker 2: sixteen sixty one finally said, you guys got to stop
37:25
Speaker 2: killing Quakers. This is not a good look.
37:28
Speaker 1: He's like, leave the Quakers alone.
37:30
Speaker 2: Yeah.
37:32
Speaker 1: The thing that they hated about Quakers, though, was a Quaker.
37:36
Speaker 1: I guess dogma or whatever. If that's not a contradiction
37:40
Speaker 1: in terms is that every single person alive has a
37:43
Speaker 1: little bit of the Divine Spirit in them, which means
37:46
Speaker 1: every single person alive is worthy of respect from every
37:49
Speaker 1: other single person alive. And that really flies in the
37:52
Speaker 1: face of that saved elitism that the Puritans based their
37:56
Speaker 1: entire jam on. That was a big deal. They hated
38:00
Speaker 1: Quakers for that. And also, you know the idea that
38:03
Speaker 1: we're all equal that Quakers believe, that's not again, not
38:07
Speaker 1: at all what the Puritans believe. They saw basically the
38:10
Speaker 1: opposite of that, like I'm literally holier than now because
38:13
Speaker 1: I'm richer than you. Essentially was a tenet of Puritanism
38:17
Speaker 1: and one of the reasons why they still have a
38:19
Speaker 1: bad name today is the Puritans went through such damaging
38:25
Speaker 1: intolerance and persecution time after time in England, decade after decade,
38:31
Speaker 1: and then they would just turn right around the moment
38:33
Speaker 1: they had a measure of power and do it to
38:36
Speaker 1: other groups that didn't agree with them. So they're remembered
38:39
Speaker 1: as being like profoundly hypocritical as a group, largely because
38:44
Speaker 1: of that.
38:45
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, should we finish up with a little bit
38:49
Speaker 2: about the slave trade in Massachusetts? Sure, because I think
38:55
Speaker 2: a lot of people are like, I think you're mistaken.
38:58
Speaker 2: I think you're talking about the South.
39:01
Speaker 1: That pronounced Georgia.
39:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, here's how it went down. And we should say
39:05
Speaker 2: it was not a robust situation as far as enslaving
39:08
Speaker 2: people in Massachusetts. That's a spoiler. But the lead up
39:12
Speaker 2: into this was before the Mayflower got there. In sixteen twenty,
39:17
Speaker 2: the Algonquin speaking people there in southern New England were
39:22
Speaker 2: ravaged by and we've talked about this before about illness
39:26
Speaker 2: that came over from Europe. I think it wiped out
39:28
Speaker 2: like ninety percent of the population over a three year period.
39:32
Speaker 2: And over in England, King James the first is like, see,
39:36
Speaker 2: this is God basically saying this land belongs to you.
39:41
Speaker 2: So he's killing all these people, you know, in the
39:45
Speaker 2: name of God, so we can go over there and
39:47
Speaker 2: have this land exactly.
39:50
Speaker 1: Yeah. And John Winthrop echoed that, like that was kind
39:53
Speaker 1: of the sentiment, like clearly God had cleared the land
39:56
Speaker 1: for the English to take over. I mean, there's ninety
40:00
Speaker 1: percent of your population in three.
40:02
Speaker 2: Years as yeah.
40:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, if you're a Puritan, it's tough to not take
40:06
Speaker 1: it like that, right.
40:07
Speaker 2: Yeah.
40:08
Speaker 1: So all of the Native Americans, even though their society
40:12
Speaker 1: was completely upended. And I guess here's my chance to
40:16
Speaker 1: mention fourteen ninety one again, because.
40:17
Speaker 2: It covers all of it's been a while.
40:20
Speaker 1: It has been a while, but I can't just not
40:21
Speaker 1: mention it. Yeah, there were still healthy, robust tribes of
40:28
Speaker 1: Native Americans in the area, and in this area, specifically
40:31
Speaker 1: in central in southern what is now Connecticut, were the Peaquot,
40:35
Speaker 1: and they essentially ran the show. There were others, the
40:38
Speaker 1: Narragansett Mohegans, they were in the area too, but they
40:42
Speaker 1: were subjugated by the Peacot. Peaquot who were in alliance
40:45
Speaker 1: with the Dutch, and they controlled all of the fur
40:47
Speaker 1: trading in the area. So they were a very substantial,
40:50
Speaker 1: tough group. And the English essentially, as they tried to
40:53
Speaker 1: push further and further south into Connecticut and below into
40:56
Speaker 1: southern New England, they ran right into the pea Quot.
40:59
Speaker 1: They're like, no, oh, this is our lan and you're
41:01
Speaker 1: gonna have to stay up there. The English didn't like
41:03
Speaker 1: that at all, and in fairly short order, the first
41:06
Speaker 1: truly sustained conflict between the English and Native Americans was
41:11
Speaker 1: what came to be known as the pea Quot War.
41:14
Speaker 2: That's right right there at the Connecticut Colony. They defeated
41:18
Speaker 2: them pretty roundly, and that's basically how the what kicked
41:25
Speaker 2: off enslavement of people because they got these the pea Quots.
41:31
Speaker 2: The idea was, hey, let's get them far away from
41:34
Speaker 2: their homeland. So they're in a far away place where
41:37
Speaker 2: they have, you know, their will has been basically killed
41:42
Speaker 2: to try and return to where they came from. They
41:44
Speaker 2: have no help nearby because we've taken them far from home.
41:48
Speaker 2: So they sent some of those peaquots to the West
41:51
Speaker 2: Indies to trade for African enslaved people in return brought
41:56
Speaker 2: them over and basically the same aim as you know
42:00
Speaker 2: sending Africans to the colonies was like, well they're you know,
42:04
Speaker 2: they're stuck over there now, and then now we have
42:07
Speaker 2: your pequots and they're stuck over here. It was only
42:10
Speaker 2: a few hundred enslaved people in the colonies, so, like
42:13
Speaker 2: I said, it wasn't the most robust thing, nothing like
42:17
Speaker 2: it was in the South, obviously, but just the idea
42:20
Speaker 2: that you know, that kind of thing didn't happen up
42:22
Speaker 2: there just wasn't true.
42:23
Speaker 1: Right, No, absolutely, And that Peaquot war and the following
42:27
Speaker 1: adoption of enslavement was a huge turning point for a
42:30
Speaker 1: lot of like big wake up call for a lot
42:33
Speaker 1: of the Puritans, because if you look at the original
42:36
Speaker 1: seal of Massachusetts, there's a Native American on there, and
42:40
Speaker 1: there's still one there today. But originally there was a
42:43
Speaker 1: cartoon bubble where he was saying, come over and help us,
42:48
Speaker 1: really and yes, and a lot of the a lot
42:52
Speaker 1: of the Puritans who did arrive arrived with that aim.
42:56
Speaker 1: They were coming like for the opportunity to save the
42:58
Speaker 1: souls of this whole group of people had never been
43:00
Speaker 1: exposed to God before, right, and now all of a
43:03
Speaker 1: sudden the English had waged total war and slaughtered pea
43:08
Speaker 1: Quat women and children, burned villages, and then shot people
43:11
Speaker 1: who tried to escape. It was ugly during the Peaquot War.
43:15
Speaker 1: So some people are like, what are we doing? Like
43:16
Speaker 1: we need to have a reckoning about all this. And
43:19
Speaker 1: I think the elite Puritans of the Massachusetts Colony kind
43:22
Speaker 1: of came to these people and he said, I know
43:24
Speaker 1: how you're feeling, Fellah, will make you feel any better
43:27
Speaker 1: if we just start selling more timber instead of really
43:30
Speaker 1: reflecting on what we've done here. And the guy kind
43:33
Speaker 1: of like wiped a tear from his eye and sniff
43:35
Speaker 1: a little bit. It's like, yeah, that'll make me feel
43:36
Speaker 1: a little bit better, and they just kind of move
43:38
Speaker 1: forward and establishing southern New England using those same tactics
43:42
Speaker 1: from there on out. And I should say that I
43:45
Speaker 1: got to chuck that up to the YouTube channel Boston History.
43:49
Speaker 1: There's a Professor Allison who did a great little like
43:52
Speaker 1: seven and a half minute video on that whole thing.
43:55
Speaker 2: So Puritanism declined eventually, gradually kind of like how society goes.
44:02
Speaker 2: Things became a little less zealous as far as religion goes,
44:08
Speaker 2: a little more open minded, little more changed with the times,
44:11
Speaker 2: and that was kind of the end of Puritanism, or
44:14
Speaker 2: at least you know, that kind of puritanism England. In
44:18
Speaker 2: the sixteen eighties, they you know, really cracked down on
44:22
Speaker 2: the independent politics and the colonies. They said, hey, you
44:26
Speaker 2: got to have a freedom of religion over there if
44:30
Speaker 2: you want to move forward and roll with the times.
44:33
Speaker 2: But you know, Christianity still has plenty of those puritanical
44:38
Speaker 2: aspects to it in New England and then as its spread,
44:42
Speaker 2: you know throughout the rest of the colonies for.
44:44
Speaker 1: Sure, Yeah, for sure. And there's still a huge legacy
44:48
Speaker 1: of Puritanism today, which we've kind of peppered throughout the
44:52
Speaker 1: whole episode. A sterling example as me an American born
44:56
Speaker 1: man feeling completely fine with being holier than now towards
45:01
Speaker 1: the Puritans. That's Puritanical in nature. Sure, so is intolerance
45:07
Speaker 1: of others, a love of income inequality or at least
45:12
Speaker 1: a respect of it among a lot of people. But
45:15
Speaker 1: then there's also like a lot of really good stuff
45:17
Speaker 1: that are chalked up to the Puritans too, like the
45:21
Speaker 1: American work ethic, the idea that you can pull yourself
45:24
Speaker 1: up from by your own bootstraps that came out of
45:27
Speaker 1: colonial Massachusetts.
45:28
Speaker 2: For certain, they have the boot straps.
45:30
Speaker 1: They did, they had little well the buckles at least
45:33
Speaker 1: pull yourself up by your breast buckles.
45:36
Speaker 2: We already talked about schooling and education.
45:38
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was another big one too, that we can
45:40
Speaker 1: thank them for thriftiness, not being wasteful, which I'm not
45:44
Speaker 1: sure that that really survived into the twenty first century,
45:47
Speaker 1: but that was a thing for a while in America,
45:49
Speaker 1: drinking all day. Yeah, although funny enough, remember I said
45:53
Speaker 1: that it started to take a downturn in the nineteenth century.
45:57
Speaker 1: Those same descendants of the Puritans went through was known
46:00
Speaker 1: as a Great Awakening and one of the things that
46:03
Speaker 1: they took aim at was alcohol consumption. And so it's
46:06
Speaker 1: funny that we associate looking down on alcohol consumption with Puritans,
46:12
Speaker 1: but it is kind of descended from their descendants.
46:16
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, Sarah, like we got this tailgating's getting out
46:19
Speaker 2: of hand. Everybody, Right, Boy, that was a pretty good one.
46:23
Speaker 1: I've got one more thing. An American journalist who really
46:27
Speaker 1: disliked Puritanism. His names hl Mencan, great journalist, and he
46:32
Speaker 1: summed the whole thing up, I think quite nicely. He
46:36
Speaker 1: very famously said Puritanism is the haunting fear that someone
46:40
Speaker 1: somewhere may be happy.
46:44
Speaker 2: That's good.
46:46
Speaker 1: Chuck said, that's good. I quoted hl Mencan. Obviously everybody
46:49
Speaker 1: that customarily means listener males here.
46:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is just a very sweet email. Occasionally we
46:56
Speaker 2: read these from time to time when people are just
46:59
Speaker 2: very very kind and show a kindness toward us. So
47:02
Speaker 2: I'm going to read it. Hey, guys and Josh, Chuck,
47:07
Speaker 2: Jerry Dave. By the way, I've been trying to compose
47:10
Speaker 2: this email for over three years, but y'all have been
47:12
Speaker 2: on such a role lately with topics that I feel
47:14
Speaker 2: obligated to spill my grateful guts. I hope this isn't
47:18
Speaker 2: verging into parasocial, But you guys have been with our
47:20
Speaker 2: family for countless road trips, houseworks, sleepless nights, commutes, the
47:24
Speaker 2: birth of our twins, twelve weeks in the nick you, weddings, vacations,
47:29
Speaker 2: out of state, surgeries for our youngest. During a few
47:32
Speaker 2: of our hospital trips, who are asked to fill out
47:33
Speaker 2: a sign on the front door that said what our
47:36
Speaker 2: child's name was and what they like or their favorite thing,
47:39
Speaker 2: and it was always between stuff you should know and
47:41
Speaker 2: blue And each time I told our nurses to put
47:44
Speaker 2: stuff you should.
47:44
Speaker 1: Know, that's high praise.
47:46
Speaker 2: It is high praise. I would have put bluey. Your
47:49
Speaker 2: voices have had a soothing effect on all of us,
47:51
Speaker 2: through monumental personal life events, through gut wrenching global catastrophes.
47:56
Speaker 2: We got the audio version of your book and have
47:58
Speaker 2: listened through the End of the World multiple times.
48:02
Speaker 1: Nice, that's amazing.
48:04
Speaker 2: I haven't even listened to it multiple times.
48:05
Speaker 1: Huh, that's okay. I don't expect it to.
48:09
Speaker 2: Your book, movie, podcast, article recommendations carry loads of cloud,
48:13
Speaker 2: as they are never anything short of exceptional. We have,
48:16
Speaker 2: in turn, recommended you to many friends, family, students, healthcare workers,
48:21
Speaker 2: comrades of all ages and walks of life. Thank you
48:23
Speaker 2: for helping us cultivate an intellectually stimulating environment for our
48:27
Speaker 2: young ones and inspiring us grown ups to remain flexible
48:32
Speaker 2: and curious. You expand our understanding of the world as
48:35
Speaker 2: it is, as it has been, and help us move
48:37
Speaker 2: forward in humility towards creating a just and equitable future. Wow,
48:43
Speaker 2: you've got the wrong email address here.
48:45
Speaker 1: They're like, this is SmartLess, right.
48:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. If I keep trying to say all the
48:50
Speaker 2: nice things I think and feel about y'all and your show,
48:53
Speaker 2: I'll be stuck editing this email for another three years.
48:56
Speaker 2: Hope to see you in Chicago. Admiringly Nelson and Nelson
49:00
Speaker 2: sent in pictures of their beautiful family, and I responded
49:06
Speaker 2: and said, Hey, if you can come to Chicago for
49:09
Speaker 2: this show, then we would love for you to be
49:12
Speaker 2: our guests. And I haven't heard back yet, so well.
49:14
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a cute family. I saw that email too,
49:17
Speaker 1: and I was heartwarmed by just.
49:19
Speaker 2: A wonderful thing. So and when we say be our guests,
49:22
Speaker 2: that means free tickets, by the way, not just we're
49:24
Speaker 2: going to give you a welcome afty buy tickets.
49:28
Speaker 1: I also love Nelson wrote in parentheses after they signed it,
49:31
Speaker 1: like Mendela or Muntz.
49:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, hats off Nelson.
49:36
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. That was a super kind sweet
49:39
Speaker 1: email and we really appreciate it, I can say quite
49:42
Speaker 1: confidently speaking for you as well, right, Chuck, absolutely, If
49:46
Speaker 1: you want to be like Nelson and sent us a
49:47
Speaker 1: super sweet email, you can bet we love that kind
49:50
Speaker 1: of thing. Just wrap it up, spanking on the bottom
49:52
Speaker 1: and send it off to stuff podcast at iHeartRadio dot com.
50:00
Speaker 1: Know is a production of iHeartRadio.
50:02
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50:05
Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.