Summer of Virginia History: Jamestown Settlement

Quadricentennial Plaza

Virginia's plaque on the plaza

Friday we took Grandma and visited Jamestown Settlement near Williamsburg. Hannah had really been wanting to visit since she never got to go on a school field trip. This is the first English settlement in the new world, founded in 1607. The settlement contains recreations of the three ships the colonists arrived on, the settlement they built on the James River, and a Powhatan Indian village. It was opened in 1957, and in 1994 archaeologists located the site of the original fort about a mile down the road from the recreation. You can also tour the original site, but we did not have time for that excursion. I'll let the photos and captions explain what we saw and did.

The fountain out front with sail sculpture

On board the Godspeed, one of the smaller ships

Costumed characters were all around to tell us about life for the settlers

View of the Susan Constant, the largest ship

Preparing to fire the cannon

Another view of the Susan Constant

The Susan Constant

The third ship was called the Discovery (on the right)

Cannon below deck on the Susan Constant

Storage area below deck, notice the plate armor and metal helmets

Below deck on the Susan Constant

Learning about navigation tools

Peering out from the Susan Constant

Sitting inside a dugout canoe, Sophie looks miserable because she'd been bitten by an ant on the log

Looking out from inside a home inside the Jamestown settlement

View of the settlement, the church is on the right

A home

Inside the guard house or armory

View of the store house, one of three public buildings they were required to built (the others were the church and armory)

Hannah atop the large pulpit in the church

The altar

The pews did not look comfortable at all

Just your average churchgoers from the 1600s

Inside the governor's house

Outside of the governor's house. It had four rooms downstairs and sleeping quarters for the servants upstairs

Fireplace / hearth

Second bedroom in the governor's house

Raised platform at one corner of the triangular fort

Blacksmith at work

Blacksmith's shelter

Learning about food and rations in the settlement

View of the church

Trying on some of the armor

Another home

Investigating the platform

Peering out through the cannon hole in the wall

Totem poles outside the Indian village

Learning about making arrowheads from flint

Scraping the hair off the deer hide

Basket weaving

Lots of sizes and shapes of baskets

View of the Powhatan Indian village

Scraping out a dugout canoe, created by burning

Playing an Indian dart game

Inside an Indian house

They were built with round ends to withstand the wind

Lots of things were stored inside

Many homes were clustered together

Another inside view

We were not allowed to take photos inside the museum area in the building, but we spent an hour or two exploring the various exhibits. It was organized as an interplay of three cultures: the Native American Powhatan Indians that were already living in the area, the English who came to settle, and Africans from Angola who were brought as slaves starting in the 1620s or so. These three cultures interacted with one another and were influenced by each other.

This entire settlement is very hands on and interactive learning, definitely engaging for kids (and adults!) of many ages.