The myth of the First Thanksgiving has a powerful hold on the imagination of modern (white?) Americans. Historians have long pointed out that the reality of those first few years of the Plymouth Colony does not really support the myth, but, like all good myths, it persists.

A key idea for the pilgrims was that God had providentially cleared the land for them to take over and farm. However, it was actually being left fallow to allow the soil to regain fertility, a fundamental practice of the local Wampanaog people, who had a complex and successful system for providing themselves — and starving pilgrims — with food.

That system is the subject of this episode.

Take care