November 27, 2025 • 43 mins
Continued conversation with Richard Pickering, Deputy Exec. Dir. and Chief Historian at Plimoth Patuxet Museums, about the history of Thanksgiving and how they'll be celebrating America 250.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
It's Nike Side with Dan Ray on WBS Boxton's Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Here you Go is WBS and it is Nightside with
Dan Ray. Bradley J for Dan, Richard Pickering's our guests,
and we have a call from Hannah and Steve in Chatham.
I think I believe this is going to be interesting.
I will tie in beautifully because Richard knows them and
they're part of the You just watch and see what happens. Jay,
(00:27):
Can you fire up Hannah and Steve as I am
not able to from my screen, Hannah, are you there?
Thank you? Hannah and Steve? How do you do? You're
on WBZ. Hello, Hello there to the both of you.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Thank you so much for your wonderful conversation tonight. It's
a thrill to listen and an honor.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
So tell me about how you know Richard and what
you're you know common interest in Thanksgiving and and the
area is.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Oh all right?
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Well.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
I have been blessed to work with Richards on the
second edition of my children's book called The Mayflower Mouse,
and Dear Richard took time and efforts to come over
as my editor and to go through it line by
line to make sure that we were giving the reader
(01:26):
an accurate true stories while making it fun with the
mouse Uncle Sam as the narrator.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
So that you might as well tell us the story
of the mouse on the on the may floor.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
I need to know now, all right, Well, we wanted
to help the children learn the true story and make
it fun. And so he is observing what goes on
board the ship as well. I was on Cape Cod
(02:02):
and Plymouth, so I did my research quite a bit
at the Capitol and the library and looking at William
Bradford's journal so I would get the facts right. And
then with Richard's help and exploring cape Cod myself and Plymouth,
(02:27):
we could come out with a beautiful story chronological order
and have fun with this mouse and have it come
alive and the children just love it.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
I would imagine the point of view of a mouse
on the mayflower would be significantly different than the point
of view of the humans. Did you and did you
figure that in when you did the book about the mouse?
Or did the mouse have kind of the same point
of view as a human would have. I mean the
mouse would just want all the humans to go away
(03:00):
to eat everything. No, he is a very They didn't
have the same interest.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
It actually well, he was looking, of course for food,
but he experiences all the intriguing events that go on
board and also in the plantation their challenges. So it's
not watered down for children. It's the true story and
(03:30):
it's very exciting and the story that all Americans should know.
And so today we thought, well, we have eight adults
coming and two children, and we wanted to make it fun.
So Steve and I made up a game called who
am I? Clues to Famous friends in sixteen twenty and
(03:53):
so we wanted we wanted them to see that the
Pilgrims are our friends, because if they paved the way
for us to their courage and faith and vision, we
have the country that we have today. They paved the way,
they were just stepping stone. So we came up with
(04:13):
twelve questions who am I? And we gave one clue
and then opened it up to everybody who could answer.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
First, I'll tell you what before you go, give us
one question, and then we'll see if anybody can get it.
And I will make this an open book exam. You
can look it up, you can use you can use
your computer. So give us one question, who am I
related to the Mayflower and the mouse and all that
time period. Go ahead, I'm ready for the question.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
This was the first run. Okay, I'm governor of put
this plantation for thirty years.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
That's it?
Speaker 3 (04:52):
Who am I?
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Okay? Very good, let's se if someone can get that.
I appreciate it. Jake, can we say goodbye to Hannah
and Steve? Thank you and I again? Because my regular
squeen isn't working that Jay has to do that manually.
All right, Well, I'm sure that Richard knows. We won't
ask him. I was governor of Plymouth. What was the
actual governor of Plymouth Plantation? Colony? Colony? Okay? Six one, seven, two, five, four, ten, thirty,
(05:21):
No prize, just another of boy or girl there if
you get that right?
Speaker 4 (05:27):
All right?
Speaker 2 (05:28):
I think I asked this. I mentioned I was going
to talk about it. Can you give us an idea
of how deeply controlled the everybody, well most people were,
or a lot of people were, by the religion back
in the day, How it snuck its way into everything
(05:49):
from the moment you woke up to most decisions decisions
you made during the day. Your religion. Now, there were
of course different degrees in that. Here's build etc. But
I guess for this example, go with the most extreme, Like,
for one thing, you had to make this horrific journey
(06:11):
because of your religion. You will risk death fifty to
fifty shot at not surviving because of your religion. Right there,
that's a departure. Can you give us an idea of
other ways when that religion insinuated itself into your daily life?
Speaker 4 (06:26):
And for people who are particularly interested in that subject,
if they go to our website www dot pli m
ot dot org, We've been releasing a series of short
documentaries that were funded by the Lily Endowment on the
role of religion in Plymouth Colony. Oh and there are
(06:47):
three films that we directed specifically at seventh and eighth
grade audiences that are Protestant Reformation English Reformation. And then
what's the difference between a pilgrim, a Puritan, and a separatist?
Speaker 2 (06:59):
That people to use? What is it? I might as
well ask this, So, what is the difference between a
pilgrim and a separatist?
Speaker 4 (07:09):
The pilgrims are or I'm confusing it. What's the difference
between an Anglican, a Puritan and a separatist? Okay, the
Anglicans are the members of the Church of England who
find no trouble with it whatsoever.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
And the Church of England started by Henry the Eight yes,
because he wanted to get divorced, Yes, okay.
Speaker 4 (07:31):
And then the Puritans are those who found there was
too much Catholicism remaining in that church created by Henry.
They wanted a purely Protestant church, and so was.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
The beef with the Catholic way. Why do they want
to extricate themselves from that?
Speaker 4 (07:50):
Entirely to oversimplify the distinction for reform Christians, for Puritans
and separatists is that the center of worship is the
pulpit and the Word of God and listening to sermons.
And for those that are Anglicans, it's the altar and
the rituals that go on of the Lord's Supper and
(08:13):
other Christian rituals built around the altar. So you have
one that's ritual based and then one that's based in
the Word.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Okay.
Speaker 4 (08:22):
And so ultimately the separatists are saying, no one's listening
to us about these reforms we want to make, so
we've just got to leave. We've got to break. We
can't stay with this thing. We perceive as unclean. So
you have the Anglicans who are like, this is great,
Puritans didn't go far enough, and the Separatists saying, we tried,
(08:43):
so we're leaving.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
One reason people are super involved in our religion is
because there's so much unknown. The only explanation for anything
is religion. And so the further goo, further back you, oh,
the less folks know. And you would assume that it
would be the case that the further back you go,
(09:06):
people would be more religious in the year one thousand,
in the year five hundred. Is that the case? No?
Or was there a yeah? Counterintuitively, did it somehow swell
up in the early sixteen hundreds? And why did it
swell up?
Speaker 4 (09:20):
Then the printing press, just as we are the age
of the internet and the cell phone.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
So was the printing press like fifteen eighty or something
like that.
Speaker 4 (09:29):
Yeah, And so you have by the end of the
sixth by the end of the seventeenth century, there are
now millions of books available. So the ability to read
the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament in vernacular language begins.
(09:50):
The whole process of engaging with deep reading of Judeo Christian,
Abrahamic tradition scriptures did.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
Missionary behavior must must have been as soon as you
had a book out there, because you could take that
book to somebody and try to convert them.
Speaker 4 (10:04):
Yes, and Plymouth played a very slow game in its
attempt to convert the Native people that you can see
from very early on. Edward Winslow in particular is having
deep conversations with Indigenous people in the region. And I
think because two decades later he will be deeply involved
(10:28):
with the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel to
the Indians. That's a London based group attempting the conversion
of here in Massachusetts. You can see him trying to
figure out the culture in order to maximize the effectiveness
of conversion.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
That's interesting. I heard of professor talking about the idea
that conversion of the Natives would be seen as success
at home and back in England and make it more
likely that they would be continued support from back home.
That's a case. Yes, well, yeah, okay, did they tread
(11:12):
lightly at first? I mean you probably told me and
I'm just missing it, or did they go right in
and heavy trying to convert the Native America?
Speaker 4 (11:21):
It becomes more concerted after the sixteen thirties and it
becomes increasingly intrusive in the lives of Native people.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
Did they have success? Was it? How was it taken?
How was it? How was it handled?
Speaker 4 (11:38):
It divided divided Native families, It divided Native communities. For
some there was true conversion, for others there was enforced conversion,
horrific spiritual damage.
Speaker 2 (11:52):
And it taken thousands of years of tradition and deep,
bone deep belief and taking some was a family and
pushing them away from that thereby dividing families. Yeah, that
couldn't have been great. We need to take a break
and then I want to do the whole Thanksgiving thing
(12:14):
and talk as we always watched it is Thanksgiving. I
always love hearing it. After this on w.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
BC, It's Night Side with Dan Ray on Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
Well, since we are here with mister Thanksgiving, let's tell
a real story of Thanksgiving. The settlers off you will
call them, that they have been here, they struggled, and
finally they made it. They kind of made it almost
a year, right quickly before you get to that, what
(12:49):
were the struggles that they made it through? Like, give
me the super cliff notes on the struggles so we
can get to dinner.
Speaker 4 (12:56):
The half of the colony dying within two and a
half months, and so there are only fifty two english men,
women and children surviving into the first spring, and half
of those fifty two are under the age of sixteen
years old, so they're incredibly.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
Fifty only twenty five adults, yeah, sort of, twelve men
and twelve women.
Speaker 4 (13:19):
No, there are four adult married women that survive. There
is another unnamed adult woman that survives. There are about
twenty men.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
And so you know the survival and let they had
to be replenished. They could never have propagated enough to
survive on their own if they hadn't been replenished by
more people.
Speaker 4 (13:40):
Other ships arrive within a year. The Fortune arrives almost
to the day of Mayflower's original arrival, and then two
years later, the Anne and the James arrive in the
summer of sixteen twenty three.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
So they just eke it through a really cold winter,
exceptionally cold winter, and then spring comes and they're able
to plant some things because the natives told them how
to do it and to how to plant it with
fish myrtilize it, and they must have just given them
they must have just given them a bunch of food.
Speaker 4 (14:14):
No, I don't know that the English arrived supplied for
a year's time. So there is this classic conception that
the reason so many women died as they were giving
their food to their children, when it's probably exposure and
infection and not malnutrition, not starvation, because they were mindful
(14:38):
of knowing we're going to have to live from supply
for a year before any harvest, whether an English grain
or if we find these native grains. But the fact
that the Wampaog were willing to share their technology, ancient
technology of corn beans and squash growing to together is
(15:01):
huge and one of the things that the archaeology is
showing us is the proximity of Wampanog families living with
the English very early on. The classic story is to
Squantum taught them how to plant corn beans and squash together,
(15:23):
when probably it's the families that are around the English
settlements watching the women, and to Squantum is actually translating
for the English what the women are doing, and that
they're watching the native women work in the cornfields that
are just on the other side of town Brook. And
(15:45):
so now that's bringing women into the story where before
the early years of Plymouth were always thought to be
the Plymouth colonists interacting with native men, not with native families.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
Interesting, that's key. That's another dissertation, doctoral dissertation possible, and
that's the work that's being done by David Landon and
Krista barana UMass Boston, because they've done the major archaeology
in Plymouth. In terms of stress Temper's flair. You know,
(16:21):
it takes a special breed of person to be in
a submarine. You're close together on really difficult conditions. Is
there any evidence that the remaining adults twenty five adults
suffered this kind of stress. Yes, and as a result
(16:42):
fought among themselves. Yes.
Speaker 4 (16:43):
That the English and this period are extremely litigious. They
are easily angered, easily think they've been offended. And so
the government in early Plymouth was very smart that they
decided we're going to do everything we can to give
no one an excuse of accusing anyone else of favoritism.
(17:05):
So the entire hill is put on a grid. Everybody's
land is gotten by casting of lots well, and it's
exactly the same sense. So you're getting where your grid
falls on the street. Is done completely by pulling something
out of a hat in that fashion, so no one
(17:27):
can say, oh, he got the better land, and if
they did, it.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
Was strictly bad luck. Right. Not all the land was
equally good, right. Wow. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (17:36):
And when they eventually divide up the land for private
property up and down the coast, the surveyors are told,
you better make sure every one of these twenty acres
is good because it could end up in your hands
because you're not going to be able to isolate it
for yourself. And so they were always trying to put
(17:59):
down any complaint being made of favoritism or priority.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
All right, now going to some pretty good detail about
you've survived this first most of this first year, how
much of the story is true? Give us the give
us the real Thanksgiving story as you do each Thanksgiving.
Speaker 4 (18:17):
Yeah, it's kind of impossible to give a real story
based on the evidence that we have. There's only one
eyewitness account, and it's Edward Winslow's letter from December sixteen
twenty one. Bradford never writes about this event called the
First Thanksgiving. Governor Bradford just generically describes the fall of
(18:40):
that year, the autumn of sixteen twenty one, and Bradford's
letter maybe only has two or three sentences about the event,
so our details are suppositions. Really, we know that there
there are the English families there. We know that the
hi Messas at Usamkuin arrives with ninety men. In Edward
(19:05):
Winslow it says the great King came amongst us with
his ninety men Comma amongst others.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Comma.
Speaker 4 (19:12):
Does that mean there are other native communities there, because
we know in one instance there's an occasion when there
are nine Sachems at Plymouth. So it could be that
the numbers of indigenous men and possibly families are dwarfing
the numbers of the English at this event, which we
(19:34):
just don't know.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Another thing, I'm always surprised by us. They could just
go out and get enough game for a giant three
day feast, yes, like in a few hours. Yes, how
how many animals? How much game was there? Yes, the
forest must have just been packed with them.
Speaker 4 (19:54):
And early on the English are writing about the skies
being darkened by the birds as they were migrating. But
at the end of life Governor Bradford comments on how
that has changed and that the resources when they arrive
are dramatically different after decades of a rising English population,
(20:18):
because between sixteen thirty and sixteen forty two you've got
New England's population of English people jumping from three hundred
in Plymouth, maybe one hundred and fifty in early Salem,
to now overnight with John Winthrop's lead arriving, there are
(20:38):
an additional seventeen hundred people, and in the next twenty
twelve years they're going to be eighteen to twenty five
thousand people.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
Right, Oh, we should probably answer that trivia question that
was presented by the folks from Chatham. Yeah, and the
question was who was the governor of Plymouth Plantation, if
you will for the first four years eight four years
was Bradford.
Speaker 4 (21:05):
For roughly forty years forty years Bradford, William Bradford yep.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
And prior to him was Carver. Yes, right.
Speaker 4 (21:12):
Carver dies during the the corn planting in April sixth
in April or May sixteen twenty one.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
So you mentioned that there was you couldn't communicate during
this first Thanksgiving the two sides, the two groups couldn't
communicate with each other well through language. But there are
certain activities that you mentioned that sports is and it
is the you know, international, it's an international I shouldn't
say international, but it's a language exactly. And military exercises
(21:44):
also our language. Yep.
Speaker 4 (21:46):
And there as we told that story earlier of the
nonverbal message of the women, children and elderly being a
board mayflower. At one point during the course of their
time together, massissotict usamique and sends out his men and
they return with five bucks of venison, and those that
(22:06):
gift of deer meat is given to key households in Plymouth.
Did the native people know that for English people that
was the meat you always wanted that. At a wedding,
at a baptism, funeral feast, you wanted that meat.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
So they thought that was you know, caviar to them. Yes,
and maybe the natives thought it was hamburger. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:32):
They give those interesting those gifts that the English people
might be looking and thinking, wow, these these are a
gentle people, These are a civil people.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
And there are a lot of other ways to communicate.
You can point to the seat beside you and have
a big steaming bowl of porridge or whatever and invite
the person to sit down. There are all kinds of
nonverbal friendly cues the business about smoking the pipe? Is
that a pipe dream? Is that made up? Was that
a later Western thing only? Or did you was smoking
(23:07):
passing around some sort of pipe? Was that a message
of friendship? To be truthful, I don't know. Yeah, yeah,
I know both were smoking and drinking cultures in that
Native people may refer to it as smoking, but the
English referred to it as drinking because they felt they
were drinking in the fume interesting, so they were taking
(23:30):
it in through the mouth, but the English were shooting
it out through the nose. Did the settlers have any alcohol? Yes,
after a while, I mean didn't they run out? Do
they know how to make more? Yes? Yeah.
Speaker 4 (23:44):
It's that the barley didn't grow well in New England,
so any housewife would have known her brewing. But the
barley doesn't well, doesn't do well in New England. And
in sixteen forty four, William Bruce, who's the ruling elder
of the congregation, dies in is I think he's eighty
(24:05):
and Bradford writes a short biography of this man who
was his mentor. But then he goes on to see
we're all living to be so old, and can you
believe we're just drinking water.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
Because for that usually that's poison. Yeah, yeah, Okay, it's
eleven thirty one plus, So we'll take a break and
we're going to find out next why this is a
super duper special Thanksgiving for Richard Picker. There's a big deal,
huge changes in his life and probably never expected them.
And the story is a heartwarming, wonderful story, and we'll
(24:41):
share that with you next on this Thanksgiving on w
b Z.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Just a half an hour ago on the Night Side.
The time flies when you have a guest like Richard Pickering,
who is the deputy director of the Plymouth Patuxi Museums.
As well as the senior story, it's so fun to
listen to the to the real granular history of our
our corner of New England, which is, let's face it,
(25:11):
Thanksgiving headquarters. Now I'm doing it quite a while while
Richard now going on ten years something like that. Yep. Anyway,
this news you're about to just Thanksgiving happiness that you're
about to bestow on us, share with us. It's probably
one of the biggest things that ever happened in your life.
(25:34):
Very happy story and something you're giving big thanks for.
I guess, and I'm going to just leave you to
it because you will tell the story best well, unencumbered
with my questions.
Speaker 4 (25:45):
I live in a very small town on Cape Cod.
I go to Dunkin Donuts in the morning to work
on my book. Everybody knows I work at Plymouth PA
Tuxit Museums. And one morning the manager Ash walks over
and she says, Richard, you're never going to believe what happened.
She had picked up Jordanian workers for the summer from
(26:06):
the Logan bus and Max gets in her passenger seat
and says, well, I took this job so I could
go to Plymouth PA Texi Museums. And Ash said, wait
what wait what? So?
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Max is one of the Jordania workers who took a
job because he wanted to work. He wanted to visit,
to visit the museum, and that was a way to
do it, to work there to be close to the museum.
I see, So he took a job just to be
close to the museum. Yep, he was in Jordan and
he somehow heard of your museum and took a job
(26:41):
in New England in Massachusetts and near the museum, to
be near enough to the museum to visit it.
Speaker 4 (26:47):
And Ash said, I did a double take and then
didn't say anything. In my head, I'm thinking, Oh, there's
going to be a guy you're going to love to meet.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
Max. Okay.
Speaker 4 (26:59):
So turns out he studied Bradford at university. He had
a professor of English who loved colonial literature, and he
just wanted to see the sites related to the Pilgrims
in the Wampanogue.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
So how did you, must have asked? How he took
that direction? There are a million directions to go as
a young Jordanian. Why that direction? Was it a love
for America? And this is the most American as American
as you can get. Is it something like that?
Speaker 4 (27:27):
A love of literature?
Speaker 2 (27:28):
Literature?
Speaker 4 (27:29):
It turned into just a love of Massachusetts, Massachusetts. He
the first day I met Max, I walked in with
a facsimile of Governor Bradford's manuscript as a present for
him and passes to the museum, and he lit up.
(27:50):
He came to visit. The museum staff loved him. And
this year we took out the Mayflower on a philanthropic
sale because we had to recertify for the Coastguard, and
that is an expensive undertaking. So we decided to have
a five thousand dollars a ticket philanthropic sale to pay
(28:12):
for that expense and recover the lost ticket revenue. I
get a call from a friend of the museum in
California and she says, Richard, I love Max's story. I
want that boy on the ship. And she makes a
gift in Max's honor. And so now there's this twenty
one year old man from Jordan sailing aboard Mayflower. Captain
(28:35):
wit Perry says, you want to work some ropes with us?
Speaker 2 (28:39):
And so now.
Speaker 4 (28:40):
Max is working on the show the crew. He told
his mom what he was going to do, and he
said his mom broke down and started crying and said,
my son's going to be making history.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
True.
Speaker 4 (28:52):
And so as we were walking back to my car, Max,
if only a camera had been running, he unmindful of
where he was. Mac just stretched out his arms. He's
in front of Plymouth rockinsa's I love the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
It would be classic marketing. But yeah, you could reenact that.
Speaker 2 (29:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:16):
All of those young men, over the course of the
months became my adopted sons, and very quickly the language
between us went from Richard to uncle to father, to
Papa to Bubba. And to think that in the lives
of these young men from across the world, there would
(29:37):
be created connections of a real father son relationship between
between all of us.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
And are you committed to continuing this relationship? Yeah?
Speaker 4 (29:49):
Because and part of it is what the museum is
all about, in that we have committed ourselves to the
philosophy of Martin Boo, the philosopher who had a practice
called I You, in which you commit yourself to being
truly present and seeing someone else. And one of the
(30:12):
reasons I think these young men took to me was
so many tourists don't see them like I just want
the coffee, I just want the sandwich, give me the cruller.
And they're not seeing this hard working person on the
other side of the counter.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
And they're not seeing what what they take for granted
means to this person, right, And so.
Speaker 4 (30:34):
Just making eye contact, asking another person's story, All of
a sudden, my life is enrich for knowing these these
three young people.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
And have you committed to knowing them for a long
long time? Oh?
Speaker 4 (30:47):
Yeah, We're We're together for life. Yeah, this this will
be a lifelong relationship of care in both directions.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
Okay, so there's Max and there there are others.
Speaker 4 (30:58):
Yeah, that a young man named a Mod who is
now going to be a college student here in the
United States studying at Bunker Hill Community College.
Speaker 2 (31:06):
I love Bunker Hill. By the way, my wife quote
wife started her career there and is now a midwife
in the mass General Hospital.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
So it's a place where dreams begin. It's a big deal.
It's a wonderful place.
Speaker 4 (31:23):
If I could give a shout out to a woman
in particular, Kiara Schwartz, who was so instrumental in helping
a Mod land the student visa so that he can
start studying in January. Just she was incredibly helpful at
the college and for us to say thank you to
her is huge. And then another young man named Salem,
(31:45):
incredible graphic designer who is about to be married to
a young woman named Zena. And Salim would show me
Zena's drawings fashion designer, and I said, Zena, you're remind
me of a young Halston. And so on FaceTime there's
this young woman just beaming. So I would love for
(32:07):
them to have the opportunity to study at either Rhode
Island School of Design or get Zena to the Fashion
Institute of Technology. But the talent that I saw in
these young people and just so hard working.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
It's kind of nice to see that the dream of
so long ago is not completely dead and that not
everyone out there Jesus as an ogre. But you know,
it's still kind of a light on a hill and
it's a place to come and be and become something. Yeah.
Quite you know.
Speaker 4 (32:41):
Ahmad spent his first American Thanksgiving today at the museum
and he calls me Dad. I'm his American dad, and
he said, Dad, to see so many happy people and
so many smiles, and it was great to have him there,
as you say, at ground zero for his first American Thanksgiving.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
So are you going to reciprocate as you're teaching your
crew so much about the United States, Massachusetts and Thanksgiving Headquarters,
are you going to embrace that, you know, reciprocate and
learn the Jordanian culture.
Speaker 4 (33:18):
I've got my living language CDs for the commute between
Wealthleet and Plymouth, and yes, and every morning I'm woken
up by Ahmad's brother who's checking on me dad, how
is your day? Because even his brothers considered me a
dad in some ways. So the families are all being
closely drawn together, which is just a great thing. And
(33:41):
one of the partnerships the museums had over the years
is with World Boston. It does amazing citizenship diplomatic work
where we as Americans are reaching out to others, and
we've done programs with them. For a Rocky Museum Professionals.
(34:03):
Two years ago, we had this group of Indonesian VIPs
come and spend the day with us at the museum
because Indonesia, for the first time is experiencing religious intolerance
in a long tradition of tolerance. And in the program
that was created for them by World Boston, they stopped
(34:25):
i think at fourteen different places in the United States.
One of the places they requested was Plymouth, patux at
museums because they wanted to know how we dealt with
the issues of religious intolerance in the seventeenth century. It
was amazing, completely amazing.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
It may not be religious tolerance so much but that
we're dealing with now, but there seemed to be a
lack of overall tolerance creep back not only into the
United States, but into some other countries around the world
as well, and I'm not sure why that is. That's
a topic for a whole other day. We will break
and have one more segment, and that will be to
share what the museum has to offer. All these nice
(35:07):
folks who are enjoying our conversation, I want to let
them know what they can experience at this museum. It
is a wonderful place. It is in your backyard, a
fantastic resource, and to not go and take advantage of
this would be sad. And the only reason that you
would not go is if you didn't know what was
(35:28):
what they had to offer. So we're going to fix that.
Speaker 1 (35:30):
Next on WBZ, You're on Night Side with Dan Ray
on WBZ Boston's news Radio.
Speaker 2 (35:38):
One more precious segment with Richard Pickering of the Plymouth
Tuxit Museums. And I would love to take this time
to let everyone know what's to offer down there. It
is a trove of tremendousness, if you will, and so
there's a lot going on there that there's a lot
(35:59):
more than people know. Can you share it all?
Speaker 4 (36:01):
Well, we're open until this coming Sunday we close for
the season. The Sunday after Thanksgiving and we reopen March
fourteenth of next year. But we have tremendous online experiences
for people. The Lily Endowment films on the history of religion.
The Texas Mayflower Society has funded six films called From
(36:24):
Compact to Constitution that get students.
Speaker 2 (36:27):
That's really interesting. Yeah, Like the Compact has parts of
it that make its way into the Massachusetts Constitution and
then the.
Speaker 4 (36:34):
US constr Yes, and so those six films are created
to help students explore those. The first weekend in December,
so the sixth and the seventh massive artisanal Fair. They're
eighty vendors coming from across the country and the entire
museum will becoming an artisanal fair with performers for those
(36:58):
two days.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
How did you you know you're from Braintree? Right, you're right, Yeah,
you grew up in Braintree. How did that? In middle school?
Richard become the Richard of today? What was that? Give
me the whole journey?
Speaker 4 (37:15):
I look back on an experience at the Adams National
Historic Site with Miss Harris, who was the curator when
I was six years old. My mother was a Virginian.
She didn't get people up North, and so like an anthropologist,
she'd go to museums to try to figure out what
(37:36):
we were all about. And it turned out that miss
Harris was from Alabama. So when we're at the house,
it's a rainy day, Mother and I are the only guests.
But you now have two Southern women who are completely
ignoring me, and they're talking back and forth about have
you can you find a good ham here? All of that,
(37:57):
I'm wandering the house. They've totally lost attention on me.
And I called back and I said, Mama, they've got
the paintings that the Washingtons gave them after the second administration.
And from the other end, I heard miss harrisy, and how.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Old is this child?
Speaker 4 (38:13):
How old were you? I was seven? I think I
was six or seven. And Mother said, we just read
to them a lot. Well, in that moment she realized
she had a fish on a hook. She took down
all of the barriers in the mansion. So I am
walking into Abigail Adams's bedroom.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
She may let you on the bed.
Speaker 4 (38:34):
I didn't get to PLoP on the bed, but I'm
this far away from the chair where he said Jefferson
still survives. Oh, and then at one point, she says,
young man, put out your arms, and so I put
out my arms, and she laid the Adams christening linen
over my arms and told me which of the Adams
had been had worn this.
Speaker 2 (38:55):
So you were hooked and that what you were after
the races.
Speaker 4 (38:58):
Yeah, and she showed me the Amistad Bible. I'm a
seven year old kid, and even many African Americans at
that point don't know the Amistad story. And Miss Harris
is telling me as a child about the Amistad and
what John Quincy Adams did at the Supreme Court.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
So this is registering with you. And oh, yeah, you
were transfixed and you were seven. Yeah, because your mother
read to you a lot. Yeah, And so there's a
lesson there, folks. And I don't know if he's still up.
He's a middle school student. But this year on Patriots
Day weekend, I met this young man named Jeremiah who
(39:38):
I'm interpreting the Standish Miles Standish's house, and he comes
in and he tells me how a fish trap was made,
how they slept in their beds, how a hearth worked,
and I thought, oh, this is this is this is me.
And so I said to his parents, take my business card,
and so I send Jeremiah books every couple of months,
(40:02):
and just it's extraordinary being in that position of being
Miss Harris for this amazing young man named Jeremiah. No, no, no,
Jeremiah could someday be the deputy director of Plymouth Plantation
the Texas Museums. Yeah, or one of your new sons, yes,
or all of them could be a crew that it
takes over. Yeah. Well, mother always called me mister Chips.
Speaker 4 (40:24):
She would say she.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
She loved that movie.
Speaker 4 (40:28):
And of course at the end of Mister Chips, someone
says to the school teacher, it's too bad you had
no children, and he says, I do, and they're all sons.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Yeah. I did not get to something I wanted to.
I have three minutes left. We didn't get to the
what the reason Lincoln made a big deal out of Thanksgiving.
Speaker 4 (40:51):
Sarah Josepha Hale, who was a novelist and she was
the editor of Goadie's Ladies Book. Daughter of a New
Hampshire car minister, she saw the crisis coming of the
Civil War and she felt that if Americans could sit
down at the dinner table, they would prevent strife and
(41:12):
so she used her influence as the most powerful editor
of the most read woman's magazine to teach women across
the country how to have a New England Thanksgiving. At
the same time she is petitioning every president to declare
a national holiday. She did it for four decades before
(41:34):
Lincoln finally responded.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
So they knew there were going to be divisions, and
they chose to focus on a point that was mutually appreciated, yes,
and go back before the division had really taken place,
and it kind of did help.
Speaker 4 (41:52):
It must have helped, I think so, because every president
subsequent to Lincoln declares a Thanksgiving.
Speaker 2 (41:59):
Right, yeah, that's true, and it would just be a
sad ending to go No, it didn't help at all. Right, yeah,
let's see that all right down and well with one minute,
what are you working on? Uh, currently academically writing your book.
Speaker 4 (42:14):
The book I'm working on is about leadership in the
seventeenth century, both Pokanock at Wampanogue and English and how
you have leaders who are self sacrificing. They're not searching
for self agrandizement, but essentially they are sacrificing themselves for
(42:35):
the benefit of their communities. That go altruistic leaders, yes yeah,
and to the point of personal exhaustion and great financial loss.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
Well we could use more of that. Thank you again
so much for coming. Good to see you, my friend.
I means so much to all of us that you do.
You know we're pleased. And that would be it for
tonight's edition of Night Side with Dan Ray and Bradley
Jay back in another night tomorrow night and then Dance Back.
It's WBC News Radio ten thirty
It's Nike Side with Dan Ray on WBS Boxton's Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
Here you Go is WBS and it is Nightside with
Dan Ray. Bradley J for Dan, Richard Pickering's our guests,
and we have a call from Hannah and Steve in Chatham.
I think I believe this is going to be interesting.
I will tie in beautifully because Richard knows them and
they're part of the You just watch and see what happens. Jay,
(00:27):
Can you fire up Hannah and Steve as I am
not able to from my screen, Hannah, are you there?
Thank you? Hannah and Steve? How do you do? You're
on WBZ. Hello, Hello there to the both of you.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Thank you so much for your wonderful conversation tonight. It's
a thrill to listen and an honor.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
So tell me about how you know Richard and what
you're you know common interest in Thanksgiving and and the
area is.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Oh all right?
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Well.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
I have been blessed to work with Richards on the
second edition of my children's book called The Mayflower Mouse,
and Dear Richard took time and efforts to come over
as my editor and to go through it line by
line to make sure that we were giving the reader
(01:26):
an accurate true stories while making it fun with the
mouse Uncle Sam as the narrator.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
So that you might as well tell us the story
of the mouse on the on the may floor.
Speaker 3 (01:40):
I need to know now, all right, Well, we wanted
to help the children learn the true story and make
it fun. And so he is observing what goes on
board the ship as well. I was on Cape Cod
(02:02):
and Plymouth, so I did my research quite a bit
at the Capitol and the library and looking at William
Bradford's journal so I would get the facts right. And
then with Richard's help and exploring cape Cod myself and Plymouth,
(02:27):
we could come out with a beautiful story chronological order
and have fun with this mouse and have it come
alive and the children just love it.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
I would imagine the point of view of a mouse
on the mayflower would be significantly different than the point
of view of the humans. Did you and did you
figure that in when you did the book about the mouse?
Or did the mouse have kind of the same point
of view as a human would have. I mean the
mouse would just want all the humans to go away
(03:00):
to eat everything. No, he is a very They didn't
have the same interest.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
It actually well, he was looking, of course for food,
but he experiences all the intriguing events that go on
board and also in the plantation their challenges. So it's
not watered down for children. It's the true story and
(03:30):
it's very exciting and the story that all Americans should know.
And so today we thought, well, we have eight adults
coming and two children, and we wanted to make it fun.
So Steve and I made up a game called who
am I? Clues to Famous friends in sixteen twenty and
(03:53):
so we wanted we wanted them to see that the
Pilgrims are our friends, because if they paved the way
for us to their courage and faith and vision, we
have the country that we have today. They paved the way,
they were just stepping stone. So we came up with
(04:13):
twelve questions who am I? And we gave one clue
and then opened it up to everybody who could answer.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
First, I'll tell you what before you go, give us
one question, and then we'll see if anybody can get it.
And I will make this an open book exam. You
can look it up, you can use you can use
your computer. So give us one question, who am I
related to the Mayflower and the mouse and all that
time period. Go ahead, I'm ready for the question.
Speaker 3 (04:43):
This was the first run. Okay, I'm governor of put
this plantation for thirty years.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
That's it?
Speaker 3 (04:52):
Who am I?
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Okay? Very good, let's se if someone can get that.
I appreciate it. Jake, can we say goodbye to Hannah
and Steve? Thank you and I again? Because my regular
squeen isn't working that Jay has to do that manually.
All right, Well, I'm sure that Richard knows. We won't
ask him. I was governor of Plymouth. What was the
actual governor of Plymouth Plantation? Colony? Colony? Okay? Six one, seven, two, five, four, ten, thirty,
(05:21):
No prize, just another of boy or girl there if
you get that right?
Speaker 4 (05:27):
All right?
Speaker 2 (05:28):
I think I asked this. I mentioned I was going
to talk about it. Can you give us an idea
of how deeply controlled the everybody, well most people were,
or a lot of people were, by the religion back
in the day, How it snuck its way into everything
(05:49):
from the moment you woke up to most decisions decisions
you made during the day. Your religion. Now, there were
of course different degrees in that. Here's build etc. But
I guess for this example, go with the most extreme, Like,
for one thing, you had to make this horrific journey
(06:11):
because of your religion. You will risk death fifty to
fifty shot at not surviving because of your religion. Right there,
that's a departure. Can you give us an idea of
other ways when that religion insinuated itself into your daily life?
Speaker 4 (06:26):
And for people who are particularly interested in that subject,
if they go to our website www dot pli m
ot dot org, We've been releasing a series of short
documentaries that were funded by the Lily Endowment on the
role of religion in Plymouth Colony. Oh and there are
(06:47):
three films that we directed specifically at seventh and eighth
grade audiences that are Protestant Reformation English Reformation. And then
what's the difference between a pilgrim, a Puritan, and a separatist?
Speaker 2 (06:59):
That people to use? What is it? I might as
well ask this, So, what is the difference between a
pilgrim and a separatist?
Speaker 4 (07:09):
The pilgrims are or I'm confusing it. What's the difference
between an Anglican, a Puritan and a separatist? Okay, the
Anglicans are the members of the Church of England who
find no trouble with it whatsoever.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
And the Church of England started by Henry the Eight yes,
because he wanted to get divorced, Yes, okay.
Speaker 4 (07:31):
And then the Puritans are those who found there was
too much Catholicism remaining in that church created by Henry.
They wanted a purely Protestant church, and so was.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
The beef with the Catholic way. Why do they want
to extricate themselves from that?
Speaker 4 (07:50):
Entirely to oversimplify the distinction for reform Christians, for Puritans
and separatists is that the center of worship is the
pulpit and the Word of God and listening to sermons.
And for those that are Anglicans, it's the altar and
the rituals that go on of the Lord's Supper and
(08:13):
other Christian rituals built around the altar. So you have
one that's ritual based and then one that's based in
the Word.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Okay.
Speaker 4 (08:22):
And so ultimately the separatists are saying, no one's listening
to us about these reforms we want to make, so
we've just got to leave. We've got to break. We
can't stay with this thing. We perceive as unclean. So
you have the Anglicans who are like, this is great,
Puritans didn't go far enough, and the Separatists saying, we tried,
(08:43):
so we're leaving.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
One reason people are super involved in our religion is
because there's so much unknown. The only explanation for anything
is religion. And so the further goo, further back you, oh,
the less folks know. And you would assume that it
would be the case that the further back you go,
(09:06):
people would be more religious in the year one thousand,
in the year five hundred. Is that the case? No?
Or was there a yeah? Counterintuitively, did it somehow swell
up in the early sixteen hundreds? And why did it
swell up?
Speaker 4 (09:20):
Then the printing press, just as we are the age
of the internet and the cell phone.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
So was the printing press like fifteen eighty or something
like that.
Speaker 4 (09:29):
Yeah, And so you have by the end of the
sixth by the end of the seventeenth century, there are
now millions of books available. So the ability to read
the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament in vernacular language begins.
(09:50):
The whole process of engaging with deep reading of Judeo Christian,
Abrahamic tradition scriptures did.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
Missionary behavior must must have been as soon as you
had a book out there, because you could take that
book to somebody and try to convert them.
Speaker 4 (10:04):
Yes, and Plymouth played a very slow game in its
attempt to convert the Native people that you can see
from very early on. Edward Winslow in particular is having
deep conversations with Indigenous people in the region. And I
think because two decades later he will be deeply involved
(10:28):
with the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel to
the Indians. That's a London based group attempting the conversion
of here in Massachusetts. You can see him trying to
figure out the culture in order to maximize the effectiveness
of conversion.
Speaker 2 (10:49):
That's interesting. I heard of professor talking about the idea
that conversion of the Natives would be seen as success
at home and back in England and make it more
likely that they would be continued support from back home.
That's a case. Yes, well, yeah, okay, did they tread
(11:12):
lightly at first? I mean you probably told me and
I'm just missing it, or did they go right in
and heavy trying to convert the Native America?
Speaker 4 (11:21):
It becomes more concerted after the sixteen thirties and it
becomes increasingly intrusive in the lives of Native people.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
Did they have success? Was it? How was it taken?
How was it? How was it handled?
Speaker 4 (11:38):
It divided divided Native families, It divided Native communities. For
some there was true conversion, for others there was enforced conversion,
horrific spiritual damage.
Speaker 2 (11:52):
And it taken thousands of years of tradition and deep,
bone deep belief and taking some was a family and
pushing them away from that thereby dividing families. Yeah, that
couldn't have been great. We need to take a break
and then I want to do the whole Thanksgiving thing
(12:14):
and talk as we always watched it is Thanksgiving. I
always love hearing it. After this on w.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
BC, It's Night Side with Dan Ray on Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
Well, since we are here with mister Thanksgiving, let's tell
a real story of Thanksgiving. The settlers off you will
call them, that they have been here, they struggled, and
finally they made it. They kind of made it almost
a year, right quickly before you get to that, what
(12:49):
were the struggles that they made it through? Like, give
me the super cliff notes on the struggles so we
can get to dinner.
Speaker 4 (12:56):
The half of the colony dying within two and a
half months, and so there are only fifty two english men,
women and children surviving into the first spring, and half
of those fifty two are under the age of sixteen
years old, so they're incredibly.
Speaker 2 (13:13):
Fifty only twenty five adults, yeah, sort of, twelve men
and twelve women.
Speaker 4 (13:19):
No, there are four adult married women that survive. There
is another unnamed adult woman that survives. There are about
twenty men.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
And so you know the survival and let they had
to be replenished. They could never have propagated enough to
survive on their own if they hadn't been replenished by
more people.
Speaker 4 (13:40):
Other ships arrive within a year. The Fortune arrives almost
to the day of Mayflower's original arrival, and then two
years later, the Anne and the James arrive in the
summer of sixteen twenty three.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
So they just eke it through a really cold winter,
exceptionally cold winter, and then spring comes and they're able
to plant some things because the natives told them how
to do it and to how to plant it with
fish myrtilize it, and they must have just given them
they must have just given them a bunch of food.
Speaker 4 (14:14):
No, I don't know that the English arrived supplied for
a year's time. So there is this classic conception that
the reason so many women died as they were giving
their food to their children, when it's probably exposure and
infection and not malnutrition, not starvation, because they were mindful
(14:38):
of knowing we're going to have to live from supply
for a year before any harvest, whether an English grain
or if we find these native grains. But the fact
that the Wampaog were willing to share their technology, ancient
technology of corn beans and squash growing to together is
(15:01):
huge and one of the things that the archaeology is
showing us is the proximity of Wampanog families living with
the English very early on. The classic story is to
Squantum taught them how to plant corn beans and squash together,
(15:23):
when probably it's the families that are around the English
settlements watching the women, and to Squantum is actually translating
for the English what the women are doing, and that
they're watching the native women work in the cornfields that
are just on the other side of town Brook. And
(15:45):
so now that's bringing women into the story where before
the early years of Plymouth were always thought to be
the Plymouth colonists interacting with native men, not with native families.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
Interesting, that's key. That's another dissertation, doctoral dissertation possible, and
that's the work that's being done by David Landon and
Krista barana UMass Boston, because they've done the major archaeology
in Plymouth. In terms of stress Temper's flair. You know,
(16:21):
it takes a special breed of person to be in
a submarine. You're close together on really difficult conditions. Is
there any evidence that the remaining adults twenty five adults
suffered this kind of stress. Yes, and as a result
(16:42):
fought among themselves. Yes.
Speaker 4 (16:43):
That the English and this period are extremely litigious. They
are easily angered, easily think they've been offended. And so
the government in early Plymouth was very smart that they
decided we're going to do everything we can to give
no one an excuse of accusing anyone else of favoritism.
(17:05):
So the entire hill is put on a grid. Everybody's
land is gotten by casting of lots well, and it's
exactly the same sense. So you're getting where your grid
falls on the street. Is done completely by pulling something
out of a hat in that fashion, so no one
(17:27):
can say, oh, he got the better land, and if
they did, it.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
Was strictly bad luck. Right. Not all the land was
equally good, right. Wow. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (17:36):
And when they eventually divide up the land for private
property up and down the coast, the surveyors are told,
you better make sure every one of these twenty acres
is good because it could end up in your hands
because you're not going to be able to isolate it
for yourself. And so they were always trying to put
(17:59):
down any complaint being made of favoritism or priority.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
All right, now going to some pretty good detail about
you've survived this first most of this first year, how
much of the story is true? Give us the give
us the real Thanksgiving story as you do each Thanksgiving.
Speaker 4 (18:17):
Yeah, it's kind of impossible to give a real story
based on the evidence that we have. There's only one
eyewitness account, and it's Edward Winslow's letter from December sixteen
twenty one. Bradford never writes about this event called the
First Thanksgiving. Governor Bradford just generically describes the fall of
(18:40):
that year, the autumn of sixteen twenty one, and Bradford's
letter maybe only has two or three sentences about the event,
so our details are suppositions. Really, we know that there
there are the English families there. We know that the
hi Messas at Usamkuin arrives with ninety men. In Edward
(19:05):
Winslow it says the great King came amongst us with
his ninety men Comma amongst others.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Comma.
Speaker 4 (19:12):
Does that mean there are other native communities there, because
we know in one instance there's an occasion when there
are nine Sachems at Plymouth. So it could be that
the numbers of indigenous men and possibly families are dwarfing
the numbers of the English at this event, which we
(19:34):
just don't know.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Another thing, I'm always surprised by us. They could just
go out and get enough game for a giant three
day feast, yes, like in a few hours. Yes, how
how many animals? How much game was there? Yes, the
forest must have just been packed with them.
Speaker 4 (19:54):
And early on the English are writing about the skies
being darkened by the birds as they were migrating. But
at the end of life Governor Bradford comments on how
that has changed and that the resources when they arrive
are dramatically different after decades of a rising English population,
(20:18):
because between sixteen thirty and sixteen forty two you've got
New England's population of English people jumping from three hundred
in Plymouth, maybe one hundred and fifty in early Salem,
to now overnight with John Winthrop's lead arriving, there are
(20:38):
an additional seventeen hundred people, and in the next twenty
twelve years they're going to be eighteen to twenty five
thousand people.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
Right, Oh, we should probably answer that trivia question that
was presented by the folks from Chatham. Yeah, and the
question was who was the governor of Plymouth Plantation, if
you will for the first four years eight four years
was Bradford.
Speaker 4 (21:05):
For roughly forty years forty years Bradford, William Bradford yep.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
And prior to him was Carver. Yes, right.
Speaker 4 (21:12):
Carver dies during the the corn planting in April sixth
in April or May sixteen twenty one.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
So you mentioned that there was you couldn't communicate during
this first Thanksgiving the two sides, the two groups couldn't
communicate with each other well through language. But there are
certain activities that you mentioned that sports is and it
is the you know, international, it's an international I shouldn't
say international, but it's a language exactly. And military exercises
(21:44):
also our language. Yep.
Speaker 4 (21:46):
And there as we told that story earlier of the
nonverbal message of the women, children and elderly being a
board mayflower. At one point during the course of their
time together, massissotict usamique and sends out his men and
they return with five bucks of venison, and those that
(22:06):
gift of deer meat is given to key households in Plymouth.
Did the native people know that for English people that
was the meat you always wanted that. At a wedding,
at a baptism, funeral feast, you wanted that meat.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
So they thought that was you know, caviar to them. Yes,
and maybe the natives thought it was hamburger. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:32):
They give those interesting those gifts that the English people
might be looking and thinking, wow, these these are a
gentle people, These are a civil people.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
And there are a lot of other ways to communicate.
You can point to the seat beside you and have
a big steaming bowl of porridge or whatever and invite
the person to sit down. There are all kinds of
nonverbal friendly cues the business about smoking the pipe? Is
that a pipe dream? Is that made up? Was that
a later Western thing only? Or did you was smoking
(23:07):
passing around some sort of pipe? Was that a message
of friendship? To be truthful, I don't know. Yeah, yeah,
I know both were smoking and drinking cultures in that
Native people may refer to it as smoking, but the
English referred to it as drinking because they felt they
were drinking in the fume interesting, so they were taking
(23:30):
it in through the mouth, but the English were shooting
it out through the nose. Did the settlers have any alcohol? Yes,
after a while, I mean didn't they run out? Do
they know how to make more? Yes? Yeah.
Speaker 4 (23:44):
It's that the barley didn't grow well in New England,
so any housewife would have known her brewing. But the
barley doesn't well, doesn't do well in New England. And
in sixteen forty four, William Bruce, who's the ruling elder
of the congregation, dies in is I think he's eighty
(24:05):
and Bradford writes a short biography of this man who
was his mentor. But then he goes on to see
we're all living to be so old, and can you
believe we're just drinking water.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
Because for that usually that's poison. Yeah, yeah, Okay, it's
eleven thirty one plus, So we'll take a break and
we're going to find out next why this is a
super duper special Thanksgiving for Richard Picker. There's a big deal,
huge changes in his life and probably never expected them.
And the story is a heartwarming, wonderful story, and we'll
(24:41):
share that with you next on this Thanksgiving on w
b Z.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2 (24:51):
Just a half an hour ago on the Night Side.
The time flies when you have a guest like Richard Pickering,
who is the deputy director of the Plymouth Patuxi Museums.
As well as the senior story, it's so fun to
listen to the to the real granular history of our
our corner of New England, which is, let's face it,
(25:11):
Thanksgiving headquarters. Now I'm doing it quite a while while
Richard now going on ten years something like that. Yep. Anyway,
this news you're about to just Thanksgiving happiness that you're
about to bestow on us, share with us. It's probably
one of the biggest things that ever happened in your life.
(25:34):
Very happy story and something you're giving big thanks for.
I guess, and I'm going to just leave you to
it because you will tell the story best well, unencumbered
with my questions.
Speaker 4 (25:45):
I live in a very small town on Cape Cod.
I go to Dunkin Donuts in the morning to work
on my book. Everybody knows I work at Plymouth PA
Tuxit Museums. And one morning the manager Ash walks over
and she says, Richard, you're never going to believe what happened.
She had picked up Jordanian workers for the summer from
(26:06):
the Logan bus and Max gets in her passenger seat
and says, well, I took this job so I could
go to Plymouth PA Texi Museums. And Ash said, wait
what wait what? So?
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Max is one of the Jordania workers who took a
job because he wanted to work. He wanted to visit,
to visit the museum, and that was a way to
do it, to work there to be close to the museum.
I see, So he took a job just to be
close to the museum. Yep, he was in Jordan and
he somehow heard of your museum and took a job
(26:41):
in New England in Massachusetts and near the museum, to
be near enough to the museum to visit it.
Speaker 4 (26:47):
And Ash said, I did a double take and then
didn't say anything. In my head, I'm thinking, Oh, there's
going to be a guy you're going to love to meet.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
Max. Okay.
Speaker 4 (26:59):
So turns out he studied Bradford at university. He had
a professor of English who loved colonial literature, and he
just wanted to see the sites related to the Pilgrims
in the Wampanogue.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
So how did you, must have asked? How he took
that direction? There are a million directions to go as
a young Jordanian. Why that direction? Was it a love
for America? And this is the most American as American
as you can get. Is it something like that?
Speaker 4 (27:27):
A love of literature?
Speaker 2 (27:28):
Literature?
Speaker 4 (27:29):
It turned into just a love of Massachusetts, Massachusetts. He
the first day I met Max, I walked in with
a facsimile of Governor Bradford's manuscript as a present for
him and passes to the museum, and he lit up.
(27:50):
He came to visit. The museum staff loved him. And
this year we took out the Mayflower on a philanthropic
sale because we had to recertify for the Coastguard, and
that is an expensive undertaking. So we decided to have
a five thousand dollars a ticket philanthropic sale to pay
(28:12):
for that expense and recover the lost ticket revenue. I
get a call from a friend of the museum in
California and she says, Richard, I love Max's story. I
want that boy on the ship. And she makes a
gift in Max's honor. And so now there's this twenty
one year old man from Jordan sailing aboard Mayflower. Captain
(28:35):
wit Perry says, you want to work some ropes with us?
Speaker 2 (28:39):
And so now.
Speaker 4 (28:40):
Max is working on the show the crew. He told
his mom what he was going to do, and he
said his mom broke down and started crying and said,
my son's going to be making history.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
True.
Speaker 4 (28:52):
And so as we were walking back to my car, Max,
if only a camera had been running, he unmindful of
where he was. Mac just stretched out his arms. He's
in front of Plymouth rockinsa's I love the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
It would be classic marketing. But yeah, you could reenact that.
Speaker 2 (29:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:16):
All of those young men, over the course of the
months became my adopted sons, and very quickly the language
between us went from Richard to uncle to father, to
Papa to Bubba. And to think that in the lives
of these young men from across the world, there would
(29:37):
be created connections of a real father son relationship between
between all of us.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
And are you committed to continuing this relationship? Yeah?
Speaker 4 (29:49):
Because and part of it is what the museum is
all about, in that we have committed ourselves to the
philosophy of Martin Boo, the philosopher who had a practice
called I You, in which you commit yourself to being
truly present and seeing someone else. And one of the
(30:12):
reasons I think these young men took to me was
so many tourists don't see them like I just want
the coffee, I just want the sandwich, give me the cruller.
And they're not seeing this hard working person on the
other side of the counter.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
And they're not seeing what what they take for granted
means to this person, right, And so.
Speaker 4 (30:34):
Just making eye contact, asking another person's story, All of
a sudden, my life is enrich for knowing these these
three young people.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
And have you committed to knowing them for a long
long time? Oh?
Speaker 4 (30:47):
Yeah, We're We're together for life. Yeah, this this will
be a lifelong relationship of care in both directions.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
Okay, so there's Max and there there are others.
Speaker 4 (30:58):
Yeah, that a young man named a Mod who is
now going to be a college student here in the
United States studying at Bunker Hill Community College.
Speaker 2 (31:06):
I love Bunker Hill. By the way, my wife quote
wife started her career there and is now a midwife
in the mass General Hospital.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
So it's a place where dreams begin. It's a big deal.
It's a wonderful place.
Speaker 4 (31:23):
If I could give a shout out to a woman
in particular, Kiara Schwartz, who was so instrumental in helping
a Mod land the student visa so that he can
start studying in January. Just she was incredibly helpful at
the college and for us to say thank you to
her is huge. And then another young man named Salem,
(31:45):
incredible graphic designer who is about to be married to
a young woman named Zena. And Salim would show me
Zena's drawings fashion designer, and I said, Zena, you're remind
me of a young Halston. And so on FaceTime there's
this young woman just beaming. So I would love for
(32:07):
them to have the opportunity to study at either Rhode
Island School of Design or get Zena to the Fashion
Institute of Technology. But the talent that I saw in
these young people and just so hard working.
Speaker 2 (32:21):
It's kind of nice to see that the dream of
so long ago is not completely dead and that not
everyone out there Jesus as an ogre. But you know,
it's still kind of a light on a hill and
it's a place to come and be and become something. Yeah.
Quite you know.
Speaker 4 (32:41):
Ahmad spent his first American Thanksgiving today at the museum
and he calls me Dad. I'm his American dad, and
he said, Dad, to see so many happy people and
so many smiles, and it was great to have him there,
as you say, at ground zero for his first American Thanksgiving.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
So are you going to reciprocate as you're teaching your
crew so much about the United States, Massachusetts and Thanksgiving Headquarters,
are you going to embrace that, you know, reciprocate and
learn the Jordanian culture.
Speaker 4 (33:18):
I've got my living language CDs for the commute between
Wealthleet and Plymouth, and yes, and every morning I'm woken
up by Ahmad's brother who's checking on me dad, how
is your day? Because even his brothers considered me a
dad in some ways. So the families are all being
closely drawn together, which is just a great thing. And
(33:41):
one of the partnerships the museums had over the years
is with World Boston. It does amazing citizenship diplomatic work
where we as Americans are reaching out to others, and
we've done programs with them. For a Rocky Museum Professionals.
(34:03):
Two years ago, we had this group of Indonesian VIPs
come and spend the day with us at the museum
because Indonesia, for the first time is experiencing religious intolerance
in a long tradition of tolerance. And in the program
that was created for them by World Boston, they stopped
(34:25):
i think at fourteen different places in the United States.
One of the places they requested was Plymouth, patux at
museums because they wanted to know how we dealt with
the issues of religious intolerance in the seventeenth century. It
was amazing, completely amazing.
Speaker 2 (34:44):
It may not be religious tolerance so much but that
we're dealing with now, but there seemed to be a
lack of overall tolerance creep back not only into the
United States, but into some other countries around the world
as well, and I'm not sure why that is. That's
a topic for a whole other day. We will break
and have one more segment, and that will be to
share what the museum has to offer. All these nice
(35:07):
folks who are enjoying our conversation, I want to let
them know what they can experience at this museum. It
is a wonderful place. It is in your backyard, a
fantastic resource, and to not go and take advantage of
this would be sad. And the only reason that you
would not go is if you didn't know what was
(35:28):
what they had to offer. So we're going to fix that.
Speaker 1 (35:30):
Next on WBZ, You're on Night Side with Dan Ray
on WBZ Boston's news Radio.
Speaker 2 (35:38):
One more precious segment with Richard Pickering of the Plymouth
Tuxit Museums. And I would love to take this time
to let everyone know what's to offer down there. It
is a trove of tremendousness, if you will, and so
there's a lot going on there that there's a lot
(35:59):
more than people know. Can you share it all?
Speaker 4 (36:01):
Well, we're open until this coming Sunday we close for
the season. The Sunday after Thanksgiving and we reopen March
fourteenth of next year. But we have tremendous online experiences
for people. The Lily Endowment films on the history of religion.
The Texas Mayflower Society has funded six films called From
(36:24):
Compact to Constitution that get students.
Speaker 2 (36:27):
That's really interesting. Yeah, Like the Compact has parts of
it that make its way into the Massachusetts Constitution and
then the.
Speaker 4 (36:34):
US constr Yes, and so those six films are created
to help students explore those. The first weekend in December,
so the sixth and the seventh massive artisanal Fair. They're
eighty vendors coming from across the country and the entire
museum will becoming an artisanal fair with performers for those
(36:58):
two days.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
How did you you know you're from Braintree? Right, you're right, Yeah,
you grew up in Braintree. How did that? In middle school?
Richard become the Richard of today? What was that? Give
me the whole journey?
Speaker 4 (37:15):
I look back on an experience at the Adams National
Historic Site with Miss Harris, who was the curator when
I was six years old. My mother was a Virginian.
She didn't get people up North, and so like an anthropologist,
she'd go to museums to try to figure out what
(37:36):
we were all about. And it turned out that miss
Harris was from Alabama. So when we're at the house,
it's a rainy day, Mother and I are the only guests.
But you now have two Southern women who are completely
ignoring me, and they're talking back and forth about have
you can you find a good ham here? All of that,
(37:57):
I'm wandering the house. They've totally lost attention on me.
And I called back and I said, Mama, they've got
the paintings that the Washingtons gave them after the second administration.
And from the other end, I heard miss harrisy, and how.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Old is this child?
Speaker 4 (38:13):
How old were you? I was seven? I think I
was six or seven. And Mother said, we just read
to them a lot. Well, in that moment she realized
she had a fish on a hook. She took down
all of the barriers in the mansion. So I am
walking into Abigail Adams's bedroom.
Speaker 2 (38:32):
She may let you on the bed.
Speaker 4 (38:34):
I didn't get to PLoP on the bed, but I'm
this far away from the chair where he said Jefferson
still survives. Oh, and then at one point, she says,
young man, put out your arms, and so I put
out my arms, and she laid the Adams christening linen
over my arms and told me which of the Adams
had been had worn this.
Speaker 2 (38:55):
So you were hooked and that what you were after
the races.
Speaker 4 (38:58):
Yeah, and she showed me the Amistad Bible. I'm a
seven year old kid, and even many African Americans at
that point don't know the Amistad story. And Miss Harris
is telling me as a child about the Amistad and
what John Quincy Adams did at the Supreme Court.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
So this is registering with you. And oh, yeah, you
were transfixed and you were seven. Yeah, because your mother
read to you a lot. Yeah, And so there's a
lesson there, folks. And I don't know if he's still up.
He's a middle school student. But this year on Patriots
Day weekend, I met this young man named Jeremiah who
(39:38):
I'm interpreting the Standish Miles Standish's house, and he comes
in and he tells me how a fish trap was made,
how they slept in their beds, how a hearth worked,
and I thought, oh, this is this is this is me.
And so I said to his parents, take my business card,
and so I send Jeremiah books every couple of months,
(40:02):
and just it's extraordinary being in that position of being
Miss Harris for this amazing young man named Jeremiah. No, no, no,
Jeremiah could someday be the deputy director of Plymouth Plantation
the Texas Museums. Yeah, or one of your new sons, yes,
or all of them could be a crew that it
takes over. Yeah. Well, mother always called me mister Chips.
Speaker 4 (40:24):
She would say she.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
She loved that movie.
Speaker 4 (40:28):
And of course at the end of Mister Chips, someone
says to the school teacher, it's too bad you had
no children, and he says, I do, and they're all sons.
Speaker 2 (40:38):
Yeah. I did not get to something I wanted to.
I have three minutes left. We didn't get to the
what the reason Lincoln made a big deal out of Thanksgiving.
Speaker 4 (40:51):
Sarah Josepha Hale, who was a novelist and she was
the editor of Goadie's Ladies Book. Daughter of a New
Hampshire car minister, she saw the crisis coming of the
Civil War and she felt that if Americans could sit
down at the dinner table, they would prevent strife and
(41:12):
so she used her influence as the most powerful editor
of the most read woman's magazine to teach women across
the country how to have a New England Thanksgiving. At
the same time she is petitioning every president to declare
a national holiday. She did it for four decades before
(41:34):
Lincoln finally responded.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
So they knew there were going to be divisions, and
they chose to focus on a point that was mutually appreciated, yes,
and go back before the division had really taken place,
and it kind of did help.
Speaker 4 (41:52):
It must have helped, I think so, because every president
subsequent to Lincoln declares a Thanksgiving.
Speaker 2 (41:59):
Right, yeah, that's true, and it would just be a
sad ending to go No, it didn't help at all. Right, yeah,
let's see that all right down and well with one minute,
what are you working on? Uh, currently academically writing your book.
Speaker 4 (42:14):
The book I'm working on is about leadership in the
seventeenth century, both Pokanock at Wampanogue and English and how
you have leaders who are self sacrificing. They're not searching
for self agrandizement, but essentially they are sacrificing themselves for
(42:35):
the benefit of their communities. That go altruistic leaders, yes yeah,
and to the point of personal exhaustion and great financial loss.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
Well we could use more of that. Thank you again
so much for coming. Good to see you, my friend.
I means so much to all of us that you do.
You know we're pleased. And that would be it for
tonight's edition of Night Side with Dan Ray and Bradley
Jay back in another night tomorrow night and then Dance Back.
It's WBC News Radio ten thirty
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