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Obstacles to Sport in the Colonial Period
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The struggle for existence illustrated by the crops growing outside the reconstructed Jamestown fort and the crude Jamestown dwelling indicate that leisure time for sport was short in early English colonies
A major element in the slow growth of sport during the colonial period was lack of time left over from the struggle for existence in the early colonies. To sample what early colonial life was like visit Jamestown where English colonization began in a site sponsored by the Virginia Association for the preservation of Virginia Antiquities which combines history and archeology. You can also take A Walking Tour of Plimoth Plantation
J. Thomas Jable examines "Pennsylvania's Early Blue Laws: A Quaker Experiment in Limiting Sports and Amusements, 1682-1740," in a 1974 article available at the Journal of Sport History online site while Nancy Struna examines "Puritans and Sport: The Irretrievable Tide of Change, "in a 1977 article available at the same source. One of the best assessments of the complex atttitude of New England Puritans toward sport is Bruce Daniels, Puritans at Play: Leisure and Recreation in New England, 1995. See especially chapter 9.
E-mail JTJWH@ttacs.ttu.edu
This page was
last updated
August 21, 2002