In this fascinating talk, award-winning historian Emerson “Tad” Baker explores a multiethnic, mingled early New England.

The New England colonies founded in the 1600s are often called “Puritan New England,” but northern New England was none of these things – neither Puritan nor English nor new.

In fact, the first English settlers to Maine and New Hampshire were Anglicans, loyal to the Church of England - people who ventured here for profit, not religion. It had also been the home of the Wabanaki for thousands of years.

And much of the population was not English. Aside from Indigenous people, there were African slaves, Scottish prisoners of war, and other Europeans. Ironically, it would become a religious refuge for some - those Quakers, Baptists, Antinomians, and others unwelcome in Puritan Massachusetts.

Far from being the stereotype of school textbooks, this part of New England was a mix of race, religion, ethnicity and language – a potpourri that puts paid to the idea of a purely Puritan region.

Watch this original, insightful and entertaining Zoom talk by renowned historian Emerson Baker, and find out how the reality of early New England doesn’t fit the stereotype.

The talk is drawn from his more than three decades of excavating archaeological sites in northern New England, and will feature many of his finds.

Emerson “Tad” Baker

Tad Baker is professor of history at Salem State University and has previously served as vice provost and dean of the graduate school.

He is the award-winning author or co-author of six books on the history and archaeology of early New England, including A Storm of Witchcraft: The Salem Trials and the American Experience, and The Devil of Great Island: Witchcraft and Conflict in Early New England. Baker has served as consultant and on-camera expert for historical documentaries and TV shows for networks ranging from PBS and TLC to Smithsonian and the History Channel.

Image: "A Map of the Coast of Maine," anonymous, ca. 1653, a tracing of the original map in the British Library, from the Baxter Rare Maps Collection, Maine State Archives (BRM47)

The views expressed in this presentation are those of the presenter and not necessarily those of the Partnership of Historic Bostons.