Some years ago, in preparation for a conference, I read Harvard College’s 1650 charter. I learned that the school’s goal was “the education of the English and Indian youth of this country in knowledge and godliness.”
So Harvard was chartered to serve Indian as well as English youth? That surprised me. My knowledge of Massachusetts Indians had stopped in elementary school, with Squanto aiding the Pilgrims.[1] So I wondered, what was the relationship between Massachusetts settlers and Native Americans?
I am learning the answer, as I audit a course on U.S. agricultural history.[2] Agriculture is an important part of the story of that relationship, which fell apart in a disastrous war in 1675. “No problem vexed relations between settlers and Indians more frequently in the years before the war than the control of livestock,” wrote Virginia DeJohn Anderson in a pioneering article on the causes of the conflict known as King Philip’s War.[3] Continue reading “A Clash of (Agri)cultures”
