Harvard Indian College

Last updated

An illustration of Indian College at Harvard College drawn by Harold Shurtleff Indian College at Harvard College conjectural image drawn by Harold Robert Shurtleff.png
An illustration of Indian College at Harvard College drawn by Harold Shurtleff

The Indian College was an institution of higher education established in the 1640s with the mission of training Native American students at Harvard College, in the town of Cambridge, in colonial Massachusetts. The Indian College's building, located in Harvard Yard, was completed in 1656. It housed a printing press used to publish the first Christian Bible translated into a Native American language, the Eliot Indian Bible of 1663, which was also the first Bible in any language printed in British America.

Contents

The Indian College was supported financially by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England, a Christian missionary charity based in London and whose president was the scientist Robert Boyle. Harvard promised to waive tuition as well as provide housing for American Indian Students. [1] The Indian College attracted only a handful of Native American students and was closed in 1693, after which the building was demolished and its bricks used for another construction in Harvard Yard. Some Native American students, however, attended Harvard afterwards.

In 1997, the authorities of Harvard University installed a plaque commemorating the Indian College. [2] In 2009, remnants of the original Indian College were discovered during an archaeological dig in Harvard Yard and parts of the original printing press were recovered. [3] [4] At Harvard's Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, an exhibit titled "Digging Veritas" now showcases the archaeology and history of the Indian College and student life in colonial Harvard. [5]

History

Origins

In the 1640s, in the midst of a crisis connected to the English Civil War, the leaders of Harvard College began seeking financial support to educate and convert the local Native Americans. The new Harvard charter of 1650 declared its mission to be "the Education of the English and Indian Youth of the Country". Harvard obtained funds from the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England (SPGNE), which agreed to pay for a new two-story brick building, the first of its kind erected on Harvard Yard. [6] This building, the Indian College, was completed in 1656. [2] [7] [8] The building was large enough to accommodate about twenty students. [9] However, at the time of completion no Native American students attended the college, and the building was used to accommodate colonial English students instead. [8] This was a disappointment as Native American students were promised free tuition. [1]

Printing press

Eliot Indian Bible, printed in 1663 at Harvard Indian College's press Houghton AC6 El452 663m - John Eliot, 1663, title.jpg
Eliot Indian Bible , printed in 1663 at Harvard Indian College's press

The Indian College building housed the first printing press in the English colonies. [9] Under missionary John Eliot's direction, that press was used to print a translation of the Bible into the Massachusett language. This Mamusse Wunneetupantamwe Um Biblum God, also known as the "Eliot Indian Bible", was the first Bible in any language printed in British North America, as well as the first full translation of the Christian Bible into a Native American language. [2] James Printer, [10] an Algonquian-speaking Nipmuc who converted to Christianity, did much of the translation and typesetting, [2] and other Native Americans, such as Cockenoe, Job Nesuton, and John Sassamon (who studied at Harvard in 1653 prior to the creation of the Indian College), contributed to various parts of the translation. [11]

The press issued 15 books in the Algonquian language and 85 in English. [2] [10] By 1680, that printing press was no longer in use. Harvard officially decommissioned it in 1692, after the death of the press's steward, Samuel Green. [9]

Native American students

The Indian College building housed a total of four to five Native American students, but only one student, Caleb Cheeshahteaumuck, graduated from Harvard. [9] At least four Native American students attended the college (designed for 20 students total): [1]

Closure

Because of the diseases that many Native Americans contracted upon coming into close contact with the English community, the building was little used for its intended purpose. When Harvard Hall was completed in 1677, the English colonial students moved out of the Indian College and the building fell into disuse. In 1693 the Harvard authorities, intending to reuse the bricks to construct a new building, asked the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England for permission to tear down the Indian College building. The Society's condition for approval was that Native American students "should enjoy their Studies rent free in said [new] building." By 1698 the old building was torn down, but the bricks were re-used in constructing the original Stoughton Hall which existed until 1781, when Stoughton Hall was also torn down due to masonry issues, but half of its bricks were again retained for reuse by the college. [16] [17] [18] Today, the location is marked by a plaque on Mathews Hall in Harvard Yard. [19]

Legacy

Another member of the Nipmuc tribe, Benjamin Larnell, attended Harvard in the early 1700s, when the Indian College building no longer existed. John Leverett, president of Harvard between 1708 and 1724, described Larnell in his personal diary as "an Acute Grammarian, an Extraordinary Latin Poet, and a good Greek one". [20] Judge Samuel Sewall wrote to a correspondent in London enclosing copies of Larnell's poems in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew as evidence of the progress made in educating the Native Americans, but those poems have not survived. [21] Larnell died of a fever in 1714, aged about 20. Larnell's Latin versification of Aesop's fable of the fox and the weasel, probably written when Larnell was a student at Boston Latin School, was re-discovered in 2012 by Thomas Keeline and Stuart M. McManus. [21]

In 1997, in a ceremony attended by 300 people, a historic plaque was placed at Matthews Hall in Harvard Yard to commemorate the Indian College. [2] [7] [22]

As Drew Lopenzina and Lisa Brooks suggest, the Indian College offers us insights into how Indigenous Christians and scholars received or were subjected to colonial education, engaged in the literary production, and contributed to the multilingual start of American literary tradition. [6] [23]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Eliot (missionary)</span> Puritan missionary to the American Indians

John Eliot was a Puritan missionary to the American Indians who some called "the apostle to the Indians" and the founder of Roxbury Latin School in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1645. In 1660 he completed the enormous task of translating the Eliot Indian Bible into the Massachusett Indian language, producing more than two thousand completed copies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Massachusett language</span> Indigenous Algonquian language spoken in the Northeastern United States

The Massachusett language is an Algonquian language of the Algic language family that was formerly spoken by several peoples of eastern coastal and southeastern Massachusetts. In its revived form, it is spoken in four Wampanoag communities. The language is also known as Natick or Wôpanâak (Wampanoag), and historically as Pokanoket, Indian or Nonantum.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Massachusett</span> Historic Native American tribe from Massachusetts

The Massachusett were a Native American tribe from the region in and around present-day Greater Boston in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The name comes from the Massachusett language term for "At the Great Hill," referring to the Blue Hills overlooking Boston Harbor from the south.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zelia Nuttall</span> American archaeologist and anthropologist (1857–1933)

Zelia Maria Magdalena Nuttall was an American archaeologist and anthropologist who specialised in pre-Aztec Mexican cultures and pre-Columbian manuscripts. She discovered two forgotten manuscripts of this type in private collections, one of them being the Codex Zouche-Nuttall. She decoded the Aztec calendar stone and was one of the first to identify and recognise artefacts dating back to the pre-Aztec period.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frederic Ward Putnam</span> United States archaeologist, ethnologist and curator

Frederic Ward Putnam was an American anthropologist and biologist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alfred Tozzer</span> American anthropologist (1877–1954)

Alfred Marston Tozzer was an American anthropologist, archaeologist, linguist, and educator. His principal area of interest was Mesoamerican, especially Maya, studies. He was the husband of Margaret Castle Tozzer and father of figure skating champion Joan Tozzer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Caleb Cheeshahteaumuck</span> Native American student

Caleb Cheeshahteaumuck was the first Native American to graduate from Harvard University.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology</span> Museum in Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.

The Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology is a museum affiliated with Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1866, the Peabody Museum is one of the oldest and largest museums focusing on anthropological material, with particular focus on the ethnography and archaeology of the Americas. The museum is caretaker to over 1.2 million objects, some 900 feet (270 m) of documents, 2,000 maps and site plans, and about 500,000 photographs. The museum is located at Divinity Avenue on the Harvard University campus. The museum is one of the four Harvard Museums of Science and Culture open to the public.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Praying town</span> Settlements established in New England

Praying towns were settlements established by English colonial governments in New England from 1646 to 1675 in an effort to convert local Native Americans to Christianity.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frank Speck</span> American anthropologist (1881–1950)

Frank Gouldsmith Speck was an American anthropologist and professor at the University of Pennsylvania, specializing in the Algonquian and Iroquoian peoples among the Eastern Woodland Native Americans of the United States and First Nations peoples of eastern boreal Canada.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Henry Claflin Jr.</span> American businessman and archaeologist

William Henry Claflin Jr. was a wealthy American businessman and amateur archaeologist. He did archaeological work in Utah and at Stallings Island in Georgia. The Peabody Museum at Harvard University houses a large collection that Claflin collected and donated.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Samuel Green (printer)</span> Colonial American printer (1615–1702)

Samuel Green was an early American printer, the first of several printers from the Green family who followed in his footsteps. One of Green's major accomplishments as a printer was the Eliot Indian Bible, translated by the missionary John Eliot, typeset by James Printer, which became the first Bible to be printed in British America in 1663. Members of his family who also became printers include his sons Bartholomew, Bartholomew Green Jr. and Joseph Dennie. Throughout his adult life Green also served in the Massachusetts Bay Colonial Militia, advancing to the rank of captain later in life.

Augustus Ledyard Smith III was an American archaeologist who worked on various projects in the Maya region on behalf of the Carnegie Institution, including Uaxactun. From 1958 to 1963 he led investigations at Altar de Sacrificios in Guatemala together with Gordon Willey on behalf of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. From 1963 to 1969 he investigated the site of Seibal, also in Guatemala.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert S. Peabody Institute of Archaeology</span> Archaeological museum in Andover, Massachusetts

The Robert S. Peabody Institute of Archaeology, formerly known as the Robert S. Peabody Museum of Archaeology, is a learning center and archaeological collection in Andover, Massachusetts. Founded in 1901 through a bequest from Robert Singleton Peabody, 1857 Phillips Academy alumnus, the institute initially held the archaeological materials collected by Peabody from Native American cultures. Peabody's passionate interest in archaeology led him to create the institute at Phillips Academy to encourage young people's interest in the sciences, and to foster respect and appreciation for the Native American peoples who have inhabited that hemisphere for thousands of years.

<i>Eliot Indian Bible</i> First Bible published in British North America

The Eliot Indian Bible was the first translation of the Christian Bible into an indigenous American language, as well as the first Bible published in British North America. It was prepared by English Puritan missionary John Eliot by translating the Geneva Bible into the Massachusett language. Printed in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the work first appeared in 1661 with only the New Testament. An edition including all 66 books of both the Old and New Testaments was printed in 1663.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Printer</span> 17th–18th century Nipmuc printer and scribe

Wawaus, also known as "James Printer", was an important Nipmuc leader from Hassanamesit, who experienced and observed the beginning of a wide range of genocide, from physical to biological to cultural, on his person, community, and livelihood. He is most commonly known for his work at the first printing press in the American colonies, yet like many Indigenous people during the 17th century in New England, was mistreated, abused, arrested, threatened, falsely imprisoned, and forced into exile on Deer Island in the Boston Harbor by the newly settled foreign imperialists. He helped produce the first Indian Bibles in the Massachusett language, which were used by English colonists in the cultural assimilation of Native Americans. He also set the type for books including the famous Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson.

Elijah Corlet was schoolmaster of the Cambridge Grammar School in Cambridge, Massachusetts for most of the late 17th century. Many of his pupils were early students of Harvard College, including the minister Cotton Mather. From 1672 to 1700, the Cambridge Grammar School sent more students to Harvard than any other school.

Joel Hiacoomes was one of the first Native American students at Harvard University.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cockenoe</span> 17th century Native American translator

Cockenoe was an early Native American translator from Long Island in New York where he was a member of the Montaukett. He helped to translate the earliest parts of the Eliot Indian Bible, the first Bible published in America.

Marmaduke Johnson was a London printer who was commissioned and sailed from England to Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1660 to assist Samuel Green in the printing of The Indian Bible, which had been laboriously translated by John Eliot into the Massachusett Indian language, which became the first Bible printed in America. Johnson is considered the first master printer to emerge in America. When he attempted to operate his own privately owned printing house in Boston, without an official license from the Crown, the Massachusetts General Court interceded and censured his operation, which in turn started one of the first 'Freedom of the Press' issues in colonial America. After several appeals the Court conceded, where Johnson moved to Boston, set up and outfitted his printing shop, and ultimately became the first printer in America allowed to operate his own private printing press. During his printing career, Johnson printed several works for Eliot containing religious material translated for the Indian nations of Massachusetts.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Digging Veritas - The Indian College". Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Ceremony Honors Early Indian Students", Mass Moments, Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities, May 3, 1997. Accessed 22 Oct 2007
  3. ↑ "Literacy and the Printing Press". peabody.harvard.edu. Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University.
  4. ↑ "Traces of the Indian College in Harvard Yard". peabody.harvard.edu. Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University.
  5. ↑ Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University (May 24, 2023). "Digging Veritas: The Archaeology & History of the Indian College and Student Life at Colonial Harvard".
  6. 1 2 Lopenzina, Drew (2012). Red Ink: Native Americans Picking up the Pen in the Colonial Period. Albany: State University of New York Press. pp. 87–97. ISBN   9781438439792. OCLC   781628796.
  7. 1 2 "History of the Indian College", History of American Civilization program, Harvard University. Accessed on line October 22, 2007.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 "The Ancient Proprietors: Wampanoags" Archived 2006-05-24 at the Wayback Machine , Part I: Nantucket's First Peoples of Color, The Other Islanders, Frances Ruley Karttunen, Nantucket, Massachusetts: Nantucket Historical Association, 2002. Accessed on line October 22, 2007. This online book has also been issued in a print edition (New Bedford, Massachusetts: Spinner Publications, Inc., 2005, ISBN   0-932027-93-8.)
  9. 1 2 3 4 Lopenzina, Drew (2012). Red Ink: Native Americans Picking up the Pen in the Colonial Period. Albany: State University of New York Press. p. 88. ISBN   9781438439792. OCLC   781628796.
  10. 1 2 "John Eliot and America's First Bible", Dr. Herbert Samworth, Sola Scriptura. Accessed 22 Oct 2007
  11. ↑ Margaret Ellen Newell, Brethren by Nature: New England Indians, Colonists, and the Origins...(2015) https://books.google.com/books?isbn=0801456479
  12. ↑ pp. 58–60, Learning to Read and Write in Colonial America, E. Jennifer Monaghan, Amherst, Massachusetts: University of Massachusetts Press, 2005. ISBN   1-55849-486-3.
  13. ↑ The Vineyard's First Harvard Men Were Indians, Arthur R. Railton, The Dukes County Intelligencer29 (February 1988), pp. 91–112.
  14. ↑ Bernd Peyer,The Tutor'd Mind: Indian Missionary-writers in Antebellum America (1997) https://books.google.com/books?isbn=155849099X , footbote 89, pg 313, citing Meserve, "English Writings of Seventeenth-Century Indians," p 353.
  15. ↑ "Takawambpait - Natick's First Minister".
  16. ↑ "Introduction".
  17. ↑ "What Happened to the Indian College? | Peabody Museum".
  18. ↑ VICTORIA A. BAENA, "The Harvard Indian College" March 24, 2011, Harvard Crimson, https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2011/3/24/harvard-indian-american-native/
  19. ↑ "Final Project: The Indian College".
  20. ↑ "Native Student Biographies, Peabody Museum". Archived from the original on December 1, 2017. Retrieved September 30, 2018.
  21. 1 2 Corydon Ireland, "Harvard’s Indian College poet", Harvard Gazette, 16 Sep 2013. Accessed 18 Nov 2017
  22. ↑ Harvard Property Information Resource Center (June 19, 2015). "Object NumberP.CHG.0401" . Retrieved May 24, 2023.
  23. ↑ Brooks, Lisa (2018). Our Beloved Kin: A New History of King Philip's War. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. pp. 72–106. ISBN   978-0-300-19673-3.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.