Early “American

Identity”
Colonial Society - Health
• Birth and Death Rates
– Life expectancy increases
• Especially in the North
– Number of women
increase
• Birth Rate increases
• Women Average 8 children
(avg. 5 die early in life)
• Early Medicine
– Few professional doctors
– Women served as
midwives
– Humoralism (2nd Century)
Colonial Life - Women
• Women's rights and roles

• Could own land

• Made up majority of
church goers
 Colonial Society - Labor
• Indentured Servants
– provided food and shelter
in exchange for servitude
(4-7 yrs)
– Men
• Few given land after service
– Women
• Expected to marry after
service
– System gradually declines
as slavery becomes
commonplace
 Colonial Population - Labor
• Slavery
– 11 million in America’s by 19th
century
• 95% to Caribbean and S. America
– “Middle Passage”
– 1697 – Royal African Company loses
monopoly
• Trade drastically increases
– 1700 - approx. 25,000 in N. America
– 1760 - approx. 250,000
– Slave Codes
• Guaranteed white authority over slaves
 Colonial Life - Immigration
• Changing Immigration
• Increase in non English
immigrants

– French – “Huguenots”
fleeing Cath. Church
– Germans – fleeing
religion and wars
– Scotch Irish – economic
opportunities
Colonial Life -Economy
• South
– Tobacco – MD, NC, and VA
– Rice – SC and GA
– ****NOT COTTON until
around 1800

• North
– Small Farms
– Artisans and Entrepreneurs
• Smiths, Cobblers, Etc
• Mills – Grain, Cloth, Lumber
• Early Metal Production
• Ship Building
 Emerging Patterns - South
• Plantations – South
– Risky due to unstable
market
– Boom or bust
– Creates slave culture
• 75% lived with 10+ others
• 50% with 50+
• Religion
• Rebellion (uncommon)
– 1739 - Stono Rebellion – SC
 Stono Rebellion - 1739
• Largest organized slave rebellion
prior to American Revolution
• Group of 80-100 Slaves organize
and march South towards Florida
• Approximately 25-30 Colonists
killed
• Eventually stopped and most were
either killed or executed

• Effects
• South Carolina…
– passed the laws restricting slave
assembly, education, and movement.
– enacted a 10-year halt on slave trade
– established penalties against harsh
treatment of slaves..
 Emerging Patterns - North
• Puritans – N.E.
– “Commons”
• Shared lands
– “Town Meetings”
• Participatory Democracy
• Had to be member of church
– Select few (males) accepted in
• All must still attend
• Only First generation granted
membership
– Halfway Covenant -
• Partial church membership
• 2nd and 3rd Generation
• Could now be baptized
• Could not vote
– Salem Witch Trials
Colonial Commerce – “Triangular Trade”
 The Enlightenment and The
Great Awakening

Beginning the in late 17th century, new scientific and

intellectual breakthroughs impacted “New World”
politics and society.
 The Enlightenment
• Enlightenment
– Begins in Europe
– Science and Intellectual
Discovery
– Celebration of “Human
Reason”
– Growing interest in
• Education
– First Public Schools in Mass
• Politics
– John Locke
 The Enlightenment - Literacy
• Literacy
– Dramatic Increase
– Almanacs
• Include Agricultural tips, humor,
and weather predictions
• Poor Richards Almanac - 1732
– Written by Benjamin Franklin
– Newspapers
• Publick Occurrences
– Boston 1690
– First Newspaper
 The Enlightenment – Education
• Harvard – 1636 • Princeton – 1746
– Mass. – NJ
– Puritans – Response to Great
– Training for Ministers Awakening
– Training for Ministers
• William and Mary – 1693 – J. Edwards – one of the
– VA first Pres.
– Anglicans
– Philosophy and Divinity • Colombia – 1754
– NY
• Yale – 1701 – Secular
– CN
– Train Clergy and Political leaders
– Opponents of Harvard
 The Enlightenment
Science, Law, and Politics
• Science
– Benjamin Franklin
• Electricity experiments
– Cotton Mather
• Smallpox Inoculation

• Law and Politics

– Zenger Trial - 1733
• John Peter Zenger accused
of libel
• Court rules – Not libel if
true
 The (1st) Great Awakening
• Colonial Religion
– Church of England
• Official religion in most
colonies
• Usually ignored
– Breaking into
Denominations
• Baptist
• Dutch Reformed
• Methodist
– Religious Discrimination
• Anti Catholicism
• Anti Jew
 The (1st) Great Awakening
• Great Awakening – 1730-40s
– Result of weakening piety
– Called for renewal of
relationship with God
– Evangelism
• Jonathan Edwards
• Traveled to deliver message
• Used descriptions of hell to
scare listeners
• George Whitefield
– Evangelist