Thomas F. Howard
EDUCATIONAL OBJECTIVES FOR UNIT, CONNECTICUT AND THE FRONTIER
1.
Objective
Understanding of Frederick Jackson Turner’s Thesis.
Materials
Use the section of this paper on Turner’s thesis or review Turner’s essay in F. J. Turner’s,
Frontier and Section: Selected Essays of Frederick Jackson Turner
. Also books by Ray Allan Billington review and expand Turner’s positions. See the diagram below.
Strategy
Readings by the class or teacher lecture. The following may be copied and used as a transparency to illustrate Turner’s Frontier Process.
TURNER’S FRONTIER PROCESS
Source: Thomas F. Howard Conn. and Frontier
(figure available in printed form)
2. Objective See Connecticut as an outgrowth of Massachusetts’ settlement.
Material
William Hubbard’s
Map of New England 1677
. The original was a woodcut 12 x 15 13/16 inches found in William Hubbard’s,
A Narrative of the Troubles with the Indians in New England
. Boston, 1677. It is considered to be the first map ever engraved and printed in the British North American colonies. The map is provided courtesy of Yale University, Bienecke Library. A transparency may be made from it for best results.
Strategy
Review map with students and ask questions about it. You may want to see if the students are really looking at it. Ask them if they can find their town. (Chances are they will not Ask them why not?) What is the compass orientation of the map? (West is at the top; North to the right.) What Connecticut towns are shown? (See top of map.) What Connecticut rivers and streams are shown? (Check DeForest Map of Connecticut in text following page 20.) What Indian tribes are shown between the Connecticut settlements and those in Massachusetts? (Compare the names of those tribes to those on DeForest’s map.) Can you name and locate the Massachusetts’ towns from which Connecticut’s first settlers came? (Dorchester, Cambridge , Watertown) What symbolism does Hubbard use? Is the scale in miles accurate? Do you see any unusual spellings?
3.
Objective
a) To locate on a map specific Indian tribes such as Pequots, Mohegans, Niantics, Podunk, Poquonocks, etc.
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b) To understand the relationship of those to each other and with the colonists in the 17th century.
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c) To be able to identify and explain, through specific General Court orders how the colonists perceived of and treated the Indian. (The relationship should be seen in terms of 17th century frontier reality.)
(figure available in printed form)
Materials
See map showing the location of Connecticut Indian tribes by DeForest (1851) found in the text of this paper. The section of the text on the Warrior Frontier may be used by teachers and students but further reading is suggested. (see text footnotes and bibliography) Hubbard’s
Map of New England 1677
may be used as well for this objective. The Connecticut General Court
Code of 1650
, section on the Indian, has been reproduced in part and includes discussion questions. These may be used with students just as they appear and represent the Court’s effort to summarize all legislation passed between 1635-1650 relative to the Indians. (only portions have been reproduced.) How the colonists located, as they were, in their small enclaves surrounded by Indians, perceived of those Indians is clear from that reading. A look at Indian place names may stimulate student interest and may make them more aware of colonial history around them. The following are suggested for that purpose;
1. Bradshaw, Harold Clayton.
The Indians of Connecticut
. Privately printed. 1935. pp. 59-60. (based on Trumbull)
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2. Hughes, Arthur H. and Morse S. Allen.
Connecticut
Place Names
. Hartford: Connecticut Historical Society, 1976: (This large work goes farther than any other. Arranged alphabetically by town with large appendix, it lists rivers, streams, towns and villages of Indian origin. Large and useful bibliography.)
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3. Roberts, George S.
Historic Towns of the Connecticut River Valley
. Schenectady, N.Y.: Robson and Adee, 1906, pp. 14-17.
4. Trumbull, J. Hammond.
Indian Names of Places
. Hartford: Case Lockwood & Brainard, 1881. Reprinted as an Archon Book, 1974.
Strategy
Student readings on the Indians, their relations with other Indians and with the colonists, the Pequot War and King Phillip’s War would help in any general discussion of this period. The map, either as a handout or as a transparency, should serve as a basis for discussion as well as faster map reading skills. The
Code of 1650
, relative to the Indian should be read carefully, perhaps aloud in class, with discussion following each paragraph, using the discussion questions provided. Student research or projects may be a spin-off to these discussions.
4.
Objective
To understand the settlement of Connecticut as a movement out and from towns along the coast and on the Connecticut River, and to develop skills especially the interpretation and analysis of maps.
Materials
Sketch Map of Approximate Town Bounds as Initially Laid Out
by Christopher Collier may be used in order to illustrate how today’s towns were once a part of larger sections of Connecticut wilderness. Some boundaries may be at variance as this map is a preliminary one. The Northcentral towns of Suffield, Enfield, Somers and Woodstock were, in fact, part of Massachusetts up to 1749 and East Granby grew out of Granby and part of Windsor.
Map of the Colonies of Connecticut and Rhode Island
by Thomas Kitchin, a geographer, in 1758. This map was produced for an article in the
London Magazine
(1758) and is believed to be the first printed map that is primarily of Connecticut now in existence. The date it shows of township lines is not found on any existing earlier sources. (Source: E. Thompson,
Maps of Connecticut Before the Year 1800
, 1940). The clarity of the map should make a good transparency or
(figure available in printed form)
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
1. What are the colonists trying to accomplish by their regulations?
2. Notice that the footnote indicates this regulation was passed in 1640, only five years after the first settlers arrived and three years since the Pequot War. What does it imply about Indian values? Did the colonists’ culture have technological advantages that would appeal to the Indians? What about the punishments, do you think they were fair? What is a halfe a fathom of wampum?**
* Thomas Stanton was used as an official translator in most dealings with the Indians. He lived for a time
in Hartford, before moving to Stonington, Connecticut.
3-5. Why is trade with the Indians regulated? What are the Puritans concerned about?
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6. What does it mean when we say that a colonist has “gone Indian”? Why was it a ‘prophane course of life’ to the Puritan leaders?
(figure available in printed form)
7. What is the image or perception the colonists have of the Indians, especially as to their religious salvation? How do the colonists propose to correct the situation?
** Wampum a good discussion of what it was and its economic importance can be found in Alden T. Vaughan’s
New England Frontier
:
Puritans and the Indians 1620-1675
. Little Brown, 1965. pp. 220-224.
(figure available in printed form)
adequate student copies. Map illustrating the
Chronological Order of Official Establishment of Incorporation of Connecticut Towns
by Christopher Collier. The information provided can be found in the
Connecticut State Register and Manual
but it is useful having it shown in this way.
Strategy
The use of a good wall map on Connecticut, showing rivers and town and county lines would be helpful. (Blank maps such as Denoyer-Geppert’s No. 7107 may also be a useful classroom tool.) Each of the maps above relate to one another and should be used together. The first map could be viewed to best effect without town names. By shading or coloring the first seventy-five towns (either in groups or individually), a movement of settlement can be seen to take place. Gaps in the map between towns represent bounds of towns incorporated later but which probably were part of the earlier incorporated town. The article, “Connecticut Towns in the Order of their Establishment: With the Origin of their Names,” found in all
State Register and Manuals
since 1935 should be copied by the teacher and used by students in conjunction with these maps.
The Kitchin Map of 1758 presents a unique opportunity to stimulate student map analysis and interpretation. It is a good map, an original from the colonial period, but it has some errors or omissions. Using the Collier maps as a base, have the students find the errors or omissions. Not all will be able to do it, but those that do will be challenged. The following is a summary of the errors or omissions. The colony is drawn too narrowly in longitude by about one-sixth of a degree on both the east and west sides. Only three counties are named at a time when there were six. The dip in the northern boundary leaves out Suffield, Enfield, and Somers, all annexed to Connecticut and decreed by the Crown in 1755 to be part of Connecticut rather than Massachusetts. Stafford and Mansfield are shown but not labelled. Coventry and New Milford are misplaced. Durham, Wallingford and Waterbury are labelled but lines are not given. Many small rivers are not labelled. (Others may be found by the students but these have been noted by Thompson, mentioned above, and by Taylor in
Colonial History
, 1978.
Thomas F. Howard
Suffield High School
Suffield, Connecticut