The first few entries in this first Geography book are
undated, but they must have been written before the
earliest date in the book (Monday April 14th 1980,
for My Way To School). Which means they could have
been written any time in my first couple of terms.
Since it’s obvious I didn’t like Geography that much (if
I did, I’d have filled those pages far more quickly), it
probably took all that time.
Just like History and English and all the other
subjects, we were largely left to work on our own,
copying things out of books. I don’t think I had that
much interest in 16th century America, so I probably
only started learning about it because it was the only
book on the shelf at the time. And, once I’d started, I
had to stick with it until Mr Geraghty said otherwise.
It must have been at least a half-decent book
though. Unlike the earliest entries in History 1 which
are littered with inaccuracies and dodgy politics, this
account of New York’s beginnings reads pretty much
like it might do today. Except we’d probably have a
lot more to say about the forcible repatriation of the
indigenous Americans who lived there, and I
sincerely doubt we’d refer to them as ‘Indians’. But
the basic facts are about right.
Apart from these:
•
‘Manhattan’ actually means ‘the place where we
get bows’ or ‘the thicket where wood can be
found to make bows’ and not ‘heavenly island’
•
It was actually populated by the Lenape, who
might be regarded as Algonquian-speaking, but
not necessarily Algonquin, which is better used to
describe the indigenous populations of Eastern
Canada
•
Peter Minuit was actually the third Director of
New Netherland (covering a larger area than just
New Amsterdam), not the first. He may have been
instrumental in the purchase of Manhattan in
1626, so you could just about say he was the first
Governor of Manhattan, but it wouldn’t actually
have been his job title, and if it was, he still would
have been, technically, the third to govern the
entire city, no matter how big it was
•
And actually, the Dutch might not even have
actually bought the land at all, but just come to
an agreement with the Lenape to live there
alongside them
•
And it might not even have been Peter Minuit
who brokered the deal, since the original
document we learned this from doesn’t actually
say who did
•
And actually they might have made the deal with
the wrong tribe, the Canarsee who actually lived
in Brooklyn, rather than the Weckquaesgeek who
occupied most of Manhattan, so the deal might
not even have had anything to do with
Manhattan anyway
•
Or if it did, it was news to the Wecquaesgeek
•
The ‘Algonquin’ didn’t so much ‘attack the
settlement’ as ‘get massacred by the Dutch’
•
The wall (not ‘fence’) around New Amsterdam was
built to protect the city from the English, rather
than from ‘bears, wolves and Indians’
So basically, every single thing I wrote was wrong.
As for the illustration at the end, it’s probably just as
accurate as all the other pictures people have drawn
over the years. But much, much worse.
Needless to say, like most things I learned at school,
even though I sat there and slavishly copied it out of
a book, it was always a case of in one ear and out the
other. I didn’t retain any of this knowledge into
adulthood. Test me on this stuff even now and I
doubt I’d do that well. But since most of what I wrote
has turned out to be complete rubbish, that’s
probably a good thing.
FURTHER EXPLORATION
Manhattan
Giovanni da Verrazzano
Old New York in Assassin’s Creed III
The Naming of New Amsterdam
How New York Was Named
Henry Hudson
History of New York City (to 1664)
Lenape Struggles to Reclaim Their Homeland
FAIRBURN
The place where I wrote
all this rubbish
WAEN SHEPHERD
Who was this strange
little boy?
HISTORY 1
Sept 1979 - Oct 1981
The Forgotten World
John and Mick fall foul
of some extreme
potholing
String Orchestra
A visit from the North
Yorkshire County
Council Orchestra
Christmas 1979
Can Waen last the night
without opening his
presents?
September 1979 - March 1980
Manhattan Island
TERM 1
A day-by-day account of
Waen’s first term at
Fairburn School
TERM 2
The birth of the 1980s -
Blake’s 7, Blondie and
battles in space
Waen Shepherd 2
Waen’s heroic antics in
the far-flung future of
2007 AD!
The Fugitive
A man runs - but who is
he? And what is he
running from?