Ask an American to name the first European settlement in what became the United States, and you’re likely to hear about the Pilgrims’ landing at Plymouth Rock in 1620, or maybe the English colony established in Jamestown in 1607. Both answers are wrong. But don’t feel bad if those were your choices. Even most history professors won’t be able to name the place.
Here’s the real story, then, so you can impress your friends: In 1526, a Spanish magistrate named Lucas Vásquez de Ayllón landed a ship at what’s now called Winyah Bay, on the coast of present-day South Carolina. Vásquez named the settlement San Miguel de Guadalupe. While we can’t yet pinpoint the precise site, it’s somewhere in what is now the little county-seat city of Georgetown, South Carolina – named, ironically, for King George III, the villain of the American revolution. The Spanish origin of Georgetown – and its role as the first European settlement in the USA – is all but forgotten.
Maybe we think of Plymouth or Jamestown just because, as the saying goes, history is written by its winners – and it was the English, of course, whose settlement of North America in the 17th and 18th centuries gave rise to what’s now the United States. But the lack of understanding of our nation’s real history is reflected in the myths we tell ourselves about who we are now and what’s most important to us today. Our amnesia about Spain’s settlement of South Carolina is just one distortion of what really shaped the country.
There’s also a sort of fixation on settlement on the eastern seaboard, and immigration from Europe – both of which have tended to erase the identity of entire groups of Americans, including millions of people who immigrated from Mexico, China and Japan. In the same way, our attention to the Industrial Revolution’s role in the East and Midwest has undervalued the impact on our society of large-scale mining and agriculture in the Southwest during the 19th century.
And, certainly, our sense of the westward migration of the European settlers’ descendants was until recently depicted as a sort of heroic effort to civilize a wilderness that had been controlled by dangerous natives – people, that is, whom we confusingly referred to as Indians, because Christopher Columbus mistakenly believed that he had landed in 1492 on the shore of South Asia, which he referred to as “the Indies.” Only recently have we begun to pay attention to the vibrant cultures that existed on this land before the immigrants brutally established their dominance.
Why does all of this matter? Well, because understanding our history gives us a grounding for contemplation of where we stand today. And because truth matters, and failing to honor the truth of our past makes us susceptible to devaluing its worth in charting our future. And now, as politicians increasingly inject their contemporary views into the teaching of history, we have good reason to worry.
So we have such outrages as Florida imposing a high school curriculum that suggests that enslaved people got a boost in their careers by what they learned as servants owned by white people. Unsurprisingly, that fits into the political framework of the presidential campaign of Governor Ron DeSantis – his rejection of what he calls “wokeness,” I mean – which is why Florida also demanded that the Advanced Placement curriculum for high schoolers drop what the state described as “discriminatory and historically fictional topics,” including Black Lives Matter, Black feminism and queer studies. “Fictional”? Really?
We are nearing a point where our schools will be obligated to teach not what academic experts view as the most accurate view of history, but what politicians consider the most palatable to their constituents, and the most useful for their political careers. A history that diminishes the role of non-Europeans in America would suggest not only that some current Americans matter less than others, but also that we care less about truth than about convenience.
And if we can’t agree to accept the best efforts of scholars to understand our past, it’s no wonder that we grapple to find common ground on what our priorities ought to be going forward.
So while economic experts agree that America needs immigrants to solve its persistent labor shortages, opportunistic politicians play upon ethnocentrism and racism to resist the immigration law reforms that would strengthen our economy.
And while we may understand that a system of advantage based on race is real in America, as so many measurable factors reveal, any attempt to redress racism runs into political opposition -- because it would require a shift in resources toward traditionally disadvantaged people.
And one more example: It’s clear that human-caused climate change is already being felt – in more intense storms, drought and flooding, and global species extinction. Yet politicians refuse to take the steps that would bring the change needed because it would disrupt the financial advantage of the donors who help them stay in power.
So, yes, we seem no more able to face up to the realities of what must be our current agenda than we are willing to embrace the truth of our history. And the two are connected. The great English writer George Orwell observed, “The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.”
And that is why we cannot tolerate politicians who try to obscure our history, just as we must vigorously oppose those who lie about the present.
Rex Smith, the co-host of The Media Project on WAMC, is the former editor of the Times Union of Albany and The Record in Troy. His weekly digital report, The Upstate American, is published by Substack.
The views expressed by commentators are solely those of the authors. They do not necessarily reflect the views of this station or its management.