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TECHNOLOGY Tuesday 27 december 2016

Scholars team up to dispel 400-year-old ‘fake news’ about U.S.

WILLIAM J. KOLE
Associated Press
BOSTON (AP) — Fake news,
quadricentennial edition:
America’s early settlers
were all pious. The native
people were savages.
Freedom and liberty were
available to all from Day
One.
As the U.S. gears up to mark
the 400th anniversary of its
roots as a nation, leading
scholars from around the
globe are teaming up to
dispel myths and challenge
long-held assumptions
about how the country was
settled.
Their group, New England
Beginnings, is using phone
apps and searchable on-
line archives to help set
the record straight about
the early 1600s — and fill
in some important knowl-
edge gaps.
“All many people know is
that the Pilgrims landed in
Plymouth in 1620, Boston
was started in 1630, and This June 27, 2006, file photo, shows a 17th century costumed role player, who called himself Samuel Fuller, in a 1627 Pilgrim Village
then in 1776 we had a rev- at Plimoth Plantation in Plymouth, Mass.
olution,” said Rose Doherty, Associated Press
president of the Partnership being paid right now to and oppression the settlers remedy such misappre- Papers,” a trove of material
of Historic Bostons, a group how you distinguish be- brought. hensions — and highlight on early New England.
devoted to the 17th-centu- tween real news and fake “It’s an important part of the crucial role the 1600s Scholars hope they can
ry history of the city and the news. But this is something the story that’s really taken played in shaping what finally turn the page on
much-older Boston in Lin- historians grapple with a back seat for a long time. would become the U.S. folklore suggesting that all
colnshire on the east coast all the time,” said Francis You just can’t bury history,” One member, the Boston- 102 Mayflower passengers
of England. Bremer, a professor emeri- said Paula Peters, a writer based Congregational were Pilgrims (only about 40
Doherty’s organization tus of history at Pennsyl- and activist and a member Library and Archives, has were) or that Puritan piety
is among 19 prominent vania’s Millersville Univer- of Massachusetts’ Wam- launched a new app — was as omnipresent as the
groups that comprise New sity and the coordinator of panoag tribe. “People “Puritan Boston Tests De- Almighty (the word “forni-
England Beginnings. Others New England Beginnings. don’t know how quickly it mocracy” — that sheds
include the American Anti- A key focus, Bremer said, became repressive for the light on colonial hypocrisy. cation” peppers many ear-
quarian Society, the Gen- is presenting a much more Wampanoags. Ship after (Example: The settlers’ first ly accounts).
eral Society of Mayflower complete and accurate ship after ship arrived, and legal guarantee of individ- “There’s a very human re-
Descendants, the New Eng- picture of how the early they came with laws and ual liberty adopted in 1641 cord in church documents
land Historic Genealogical settlers interacted with Na- deeds. You really have to also condoned slavery.) of people getting in fights,
Society, Rhode Island’s To- tive Americans. put yourself in the moc- Another member, the Co- abandonment, sexual
maquag Museum, Britain’s Underscoring the gulf be- casins of the people who lonial Society of Massachu- abuse,” said Peggy Ben-
History of Independence tween how natives and were enduring that.” setts, is preparing an online droth, director of the Con-
Project and the Leiden white Americans see his- Peters’ pet peeve: “This edition of Plymouth Gov. gregational Library and Ar-
American Pilgrim Museum tory, on every Thanksgiv- myth of the friendly Indians William Bradford’s history, chives.
in the Netherlands. ing since 1970, members of and the grateful Pilgrims “Of Plymouth Plantation,” “They were very compli-
Together, they see an New England tribes have who met in Plymouth by with notes reflecting Native cated people full of para-
opening as the U.S. pre- gathered in downtown the grace of God and ev- American perspectives. A doxes and subtleties,” she
pares in 2020 to mark the Plymouth for a solemn eryone lived happily ever third, the Massachusetts said. “It was just as much
400th anniversary of the Pil- National Day of Mourn- after.” Historical Society, soon will of a struggle for them as for
grims’ arrival in 1620. ing observance that re- New England Beginnings release a searchable online us.”q
“There’s a lot of attention calls the disease, racism is turning to technology to version of “The Winthrop