Use real pottery images, a documentary record about enslaved artisans, and a comparison of leaders. Keep what you see separate from what you infer.
Use with Chapter 5 · 3.T5.1–5
Observe shape, handle, opening, color, and decoration. These are comparison objects from a museum collection, not finds from the Big Dig. Read the collection labels before making a claim about their place or date.
North Shore redware jug · Object: circa 1780; photograph: December 21, 2017
Museum object record ↗
Massachusetts redware cup or porringer · Object: 1800–1830; photograph: December 21, 2017
Museum object record ↗
A probate inventory made after Isaac Parker died names Jack, an enslaved man, and Acton, an enslaved boy. Researchers studying the Parker–Harris pottery connect this record to skilled pottery labor. Thousands of broken vessels help investigate the workshop, but fragments do not automatically reveal which individual made each pot.
Grace Parker ran the pottery after her husband’s death. The business history and the lives of people forced to work there are both part of the evidence.
| Person | Community & time | Action or goal | Question about power |
|---|---|---|---|
| William Bradford | Plymouth, 1600s | Led an English Separatist colony and wrote its history. | Whose experience does a governor’s account emphasize? |
| John Winthrop | Massachusetts Bay, from 1630 | Led Puritan settlers seeking a religiously ordered community. | Did religious freedom extend to dissenters? |
| Ousamequin | Pokanoket Wampanoag, early 1600s | Negotiated an alliance with Plymouth in 1621. | What pressures shaped diplomacy? |
| Metacom | Wampanoag, later 1600s | Resisted colonial expansion; war began in 1675. | How did loss of land threaten a community? |
Summaries for comparison: Plimoth Patuxet ↗ · Aquinnah tribal history ↗ · Chapter 5 sources.
A household might include relatives, apprentices, hired workers, indentured servants, or enslaved people. An indentured servant was bound by a contract for a period of service. An enslaved person was denied freedom as property under the law. Neither term means the same thing as a paid worker.
Children learned at home, through work and apprenticeships, and in schools where available. Gender, wealth, legal status, and community affected a person’s choices. A pot alone cannot prove who attended school or controlled their own labor.
Barter exchanges goods or services without money. Maritime commerce moves goods by sea. Ships connected Massachusetts ports to other Atlantic places, including economies built on enslaved labor. People subjected to trafficking were human beings, not ordinary cargo.
Classroom example, not a historical price: A farmer exchanges corn for a repaired tool. Identify the two goods or services. What information would show whether this actually happened at a particular place and time?
Salem Maritime historical sources ↗Responses stay in this page session. Use Print / save PDF to keep a copy. Do not enter names or private family information.
Accept careful visual descriptions rather than guesses about contents or ownership. Jack and Acton were skilled people held in slavery; being named in a record does not establish authorship of any individual vessel. Compare leaders in their own contexts rather than treating them as interchangeable “sides.”
Success check: The student identifies the source, uses an accurate detail, explains how it supports the claim, and names a limit or unanswered question. Different supported conclusions are welcome.