Visiting historic Plymouth, where Thanksgiving began

Thanksgiving Day will be celebrated as always with family gatherings, festive turkey dinners, football and other holiday traditions, but it’s also a time to remember the hardy group known as Pilgrims who established the first successful New England colony and marked their first Thanksgiving in Plymouth, Massachusetts. .

The famous Plymouth Rock is often the first stop for tourists. It’s a plain and rather small boulder on the waterfront, with an enclosed portico built to shelter it. On the rock, the date 1620 is engraved, marking the arrival of the first Pilgrims.

Sometimes visitors seem a bit disappointed when they first see Plymouth Rock.

“Is that it? It looks much smaller than I expected,” said one tourist.

For most, the power of the rock is its symbolism, not its size. A Plymouth tourist guidebook quotes Alexis de Toqueville ‘s observation: “Here is a stone which the feet of a few outcasts pressed for an instant; and the stone becomes famous; it is treasured by a great nation; its very dust is shared as a relic.”

Even if Plymouth Rock is the most famous here, another major attraction - and a much more extensive one - is Plimoth Plantation. (This is the name and spelling that Pilgrims gave to their first settlement)

“Welcome to the 17th Century” reads the large sign that greets visitors to this 140 acre site. And as soon as we walked past the sign, we indeed felt transported back in time as we explored this re-creation of a 1627 farming community built by the Pilgrims.

Here, colonial Plymouth comes vividly to life. There are the modest timberframed houses. Visitors are welcome to step inside and reproductions of the objects the Pilgrims owned, including tables, chairs, beds, utensils and more.

Moreover, we met Pilgrims in 17th century attire who answered questions and spoke in the dialect of the early settlers.

In real life, of course, they’re not Pilgrims but highly knowledgeable colonial interpreters who go through a rigorous training program. Then they take on the roles of actual colonials who lived here. The names and specifics of these colonials were carefully researched by checking re-

PHOTO COURTESY OF SEEPLYMOUTH.COM. Thanksgiving dinner at a 1627 English Village sells out very early in the year.

PHOTO COURTESY OF SEEPLYMOUTH.COM The Plimouth Grist Mills stands pretty much as it did in the 1600s.

PHOTO BY KRISTEN ONEY It’s like stepping into a 17th Century English Village at Plimoth Plantation.