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When the Pilgrims landed in 1620, they arrived on the shores of a land that was inhabited by the Wampanoag (Wam-pa-NO-ag) Indians. These Indians were a very peaceful people who treated their fellow brothers and sisters, along with the forest and everything in it, as their equals.

The one thing these people abhorred more than anything else was greed. They were taught to share and preserve that which they were given. So it is little wonder that when the Pilgrims landed in early winter, these Wampanoag Indians came to their rescue and shared food with them during the winter and then helped them learn how to grow crops in this new land the following summer.

Celebrating a Thanksgiving with their new friends was not unusual. You see, the Wampanoags celebrated 6 Thanksgivings a year, giving thanks for what nature and the earth provided.

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This cozy relationship did not last long. The Pilgrims who came from England were of a religion that strived to force everyone into their beliefs. Those Pilgrims who remained faithful to this purpose were called Puritans. As more Puritans arrived from England, their need for help from the Wampanoags decreased. They began pressing the Wampanoags to convert to their religion, saying that the Indian’s ways were wrong and evil.

The relationship between the Wampanoags and the Pilgrims deteriorated, and within a few years the children of the people who ate together at the First Thanksgiving were killing one another in what came to be called King Philip’s War.

Today the town of Plymouth, Massachusetts has an annual Thanksgiving ceremony in remembrance of that First Thanksgiving. In 1970, one of the remaining Wampanoag Indians was asked to speak. Here is part of what he said:

     "Today is a time of celebrating for you – a time of looking back to the first days of white people in America. But it is not a time of celebrating for me. It is with a heavy heart that I look back upon what happened to my People. When the Pilgrims arrived, we, the Wampanoags, welcomed them with open arms, little knowing that it was the beginning of the end. That before 50 years were to pass, the Wampanoag would no longer be a tribe. That we and other Indians living near the settlers would be killed by their guns or dead from diseases that we caught from them. Let us always remember, the Indian is and was just as human as the white people.

     “Although our way of life is almost gone, we, the Wampanoags, still walk the lands of Massachusetts. What has happened cannot be changed. But today we work toward a better America, a more Indian America where people and nature once again are important."

Doug
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