Jamestown

Jamestown, Virginia, was the first permanent English settlement in North America. After crossing the Atlantic Ocean, in the spring of 1607, the three ships Susan Constant, Godspeed, and Discovery sailed up a river from the Chesapeake Bay and stopped at a small peninsula. The 105 men who settled there named the river James and site Jamestown in honor of their King, James I of England. This group came to America to make a profit. They were sponsored by the Virginia Company of London. Captain John Smith, John Rolfe, and Thomas West (Lord De la Warr), Powhatan, and his daughter Pocahontas were influential people in the early days of the Virginia colony. Travilah fifth graders visited this recreated historical site in December 1997.

Tour Guides gave small groups of students and parents information at each site.

Students boarded replicas of the original ships.

Sailors told what the sea journey was like.

Passengers and crew slept on straw pallets. The ship was very crowded.

Prepared for attacks by native tribes or the Spanish, the settlers (many of whom were soldiers) were well armed.

Students watched a soldier demonstrate musket fire.

The soldiers brought heavy armor with them.

The wooden fort was triangular in shape with cannon on each bulwark.

 

Houses were built inside the fort.

The settlers built houses to look like those they left in England with a thatched roof, a door, and a small window.

They used wood from nearby forests.

The church provided the settlers with a meeting place.

 

In the Indian village, they built longhouses out of woven reed mats. There was a smokehole in the roof.

Students asked questions at each site.

The skin of a whitetail deer was being prepared to make leather for clothing.

These students used a bone tool to scrape fur from the hide.

Rope was made by braiding native plants. It was very strong.

Sharp bone was used to chip rocks to make tools and arrowheads.

Near Jamestown is a National Park dedicated to glassblowing, a colonial trade.

One of the earliest industries in the colonies was glassblowing. High heat was needed inside the furnace.

Hot glass was blown through a long wooden pipe and then shaped.

Workers were very skilled.

Next stop Yorktown!

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Created on January 16, 1998 by Mary Beth Castonguay <mbc@umd5.umd.edu>