The Squanto we never knew…

Squanto-we never knew you

I said it before and I’ll say it again: Truth is always more knobbly and interesting than that tasteless gruel they serve up in our schools as U.S. History; a subject most students regard as the most boring they are forced to endure.

But how can stories of real human beings interacting across time be boring? Only if you turn the human beings into cardboard cutouts, which is precisely what history textbooks do.

Take Squanto for example, Cardboard Version: The brave Pilgrims, seeking religious freedom, providentially encountered a native in the new land named Squanto, who had somehow learned to speak English! He taught them how to bury fish to fertilize corn and they had a big feast that fall which became Thanksgiving.

What’s the real deal with Squanto?

First, his real name was Tisquantum and he was a member of the Pawtuxet band of the…