I have chosen a website from the National Postal Museum in association with the Smithsonian Institution.
The page is titled Letter Writing in America and, as the title suggests, discusses early American settlers' means of communcating and the reasons behind their descriptive reports. I found these reasons to be interesting, especially the drive behind describing the New World with such enthusiasm and glory in order to satisfy their investors and reasure them that there was, infact, riches to be had.
http://www.postalmuseum.si.edu/LetterWriting/lw01.html
I found this webpage through the Smithsonian website. I chose this particular website because I know the Smithsonian is a reliable source and letter writing right now, for me, is quite interesting because I am sending letters to my family ("investors" of sorts) back home and they like to hear vivid details as well. These days, being able to use a telephone for most of that is much more convenient!
4 comments:
I think the website kate found was really very interesting, i hadn't thought about how the 'settlers' would communicate with home, and what they would say to people back home. Although letters would have taken a long time to get back to England, by the time the letter got home, a lot of change could have happened, if the 'settler' had written to say they were ill then by the time the letter got back to England that person could have been dead. its a shame they didn't have telephones!!
The aspect of communication never really occurred to me before Kate brought it up. In modern times we take equipment such as the Internet and telephone for granted. The time span in which families would have been able to communicate must have been very long and painful.
Another topic which was brought up on the website was that not only was the journey to N.America to spread England's colonies, but it was a chance for people to make a new start.
"Husbands looking for a better life sailed to the new world with the promise that, when they were settled and secure, their wives and children would come to join them."
This must have also put a lot of stress on the families back home.
I find the article from the National Postal Museum useful too, in how it shows the significant use of writing letters in communicating with the outside world. I find it ironic that the early ‘explorers’ used letters to keep potential investors and sponsors interested, described how beautiful the land was with “Eden-like surroundings, abundant food and resources” but yet found it themselves practically uninhabitable, as most died from starvation. It is later written near the end of the article how one particular ‘settler’ had “eaten more in [one] day at home” than he was “allowed [to eat] … here for a week”.
Arriving at the ‘new world’ must have been seen with a lot of potential and promise, but for the fleet admirals and conquistadors to whitewash the various flaws of the place in order to keep the sponsors interested, suggest how much corruption and greed there was around.
Thank you Katie, for the posting and thanks too to the others for their comments. I also found this article highly interesting and potentially useful, as it not only came from a notably reliable source, but it also presented some fascinating ideas on the role of letters in the communications between new and old worlds.
This is particularly timely now, with our current postal strike, for we are forced to contemplate how essential the postal aspect of communications can be. Let's all consider how the role of the post has changed with the advent of email/sms/text/skype/etc in our discussion tomorrow. Also, Katie, I am both intrigued and impressed at your insight into how your letters home can act as investor's reports....let's chat more about this in our small groups!
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