It was September 26, 1774, in Leominster, Massachusetts. Colonists were just beginning to pick newly ripened apples from their trees. Nathaniel and Elizabeth Chapman were celebrating. Their first son was born that day. They named him John, but someday he would be better known as Johnny Appleseed.
Johnny also had a sister named Elizabeth. She was four years old. The family was poor and lived in a small house they rented from relatives. Though Johnny’s father did farming and carpentry work, he wasn’t very successful.
Shortly before Johnny was born, his father had taken on yet a third job. At that time, many colonists wanted to go to war against England. They hoped to break away and form a new country. Like many of these patriots, Johnny’s father became a minuteman. Minutemen promised to defend the thirteen colonies from English troops at a minute’s notice.
When Johnny was less than a year old, his father was called to duty. He helped fight the English at the battle of Bunker Hill.
By the spring of 1776, his father was marching with George Washington’s army. That July, the Declaration of Independence was signed. The colonies were fighting for independence from England in the Revolutionary War.
That same year, before Johnny’s second birthday, something terrible happened. His mother and newborn brother died. Johnny was probably too young to understand what was going on, but he no doubt missed his mother. Since their father was still in the army, Johnny and his sister went to live with their grandparents.
At the age of five, Johnny got a new stepmother. His father married a woman named Lucy Cooley and left the army. The family of four moved to the nearby town of Longmeadow.
Ten more children were born into the Chapman family over the following years. Imagine such a big family living in one small farmhouse!
To get some peace and quiet, Johnny spent much of his time outside. The Connecticut River flowed near his house and a forest grew nearby.
Johnny felt more at home outdoors than he did in the overcrowded farmhouse. In the woods, he could be as free as the Native Americans and woodsmen that roamed the frontier.
There was a school in Longmeadow, which Johnny attended for a few years. There he learned to write in a handwriting style called “round hand.” He learned to love books, as he would for the rest of his life.
Boys could get jobs to earn money at age fourteen. Johnny probably learned how to grow apples by working in an apple orchard when he was a teenager. His interest in apples began to blossom.
THE BOSTON TEA PARTY
TODAY, AMERICANS DRINK MORE COFFEE THAN TEA. BUT IN JOHNNY APPLESEED’S TIME, IT WAS THE OTHER WAY AROUND. TEA WAS MORE POPULAR. SO THE COLONISTS GOT REALLY MAD WHEN THE ENGLISH GOVERNMENT PUT A TAX ON IT.
BEGINNING IN 1765, ENGLAND SAID COLONISTS HAD TO PAY TAXES ON IMPORTED GLASS, LEAD, PAINT, PAPER, AND TEA. COLONISTS DIDN’T WANT TO BE TAXED IF THEY WEREN’T ALLOWED ANY SAY IN MAKING LAWS. THEY DID EVERYTHING THEY COULD TO AVOID PAYING THE TAXES. ON DECEMBER 16, 1773, A GROUP OF COLONISTS DECIDED TO PROTEST THE TEA TAX IN A BIG WAY. DISGUISED AS MEMBERS OF THE MOHAWK TRIBE, THEY SNEAKED ONTO SHIPS DOCKED IN BOSTON HARBOR. THE SHIPS WERE LOADED WITH 342 BOXES OF TEA. MANY COLONISTS LIKED TEA SO MUCH THAT THEY HAD A HARD TIME DOING WITHOUT IT. TO STOP ANYONE FROM BUYING THE TEA, THESE MEN TOSSED IT OVERBOARD.
THIS PROTEST BECAME KNOWN AS THE BOSTON TEA PARTY. IT HAPPENED JUST FIFTY MILES FROM LEOMINSTER, WHERE JOHNNY WAS BORN NINE MONTHS LATER.
A PIONEER SCHOOL
SOME CHILDREN IN THE FRONTIER DIDN’T GO TO SCHOOL AND NEVER LEARNED TO READ OR WRITE. OTHERS WERE TAUGHT AT HOME BY THEIR PARENTS. IF AN AREA HAD A SCHOOL, THE SCHOOLHOUSE WAS USUALLY ONLY ONE ROOM IN WHICH STUDENTS OF ALL AGES WERE TAUGHT READING, WRITING, AND MATH.
STUDENTS USUALLY HAD TO BRING THEIR OWN BOOKS, CALLED PRIMERS, READERS, OR SPELLERS. NOAH WEBSTER’S AMERICAN SPELLING BOOK, PUBLISHED IN 1783, CONTAINED LISTS OF VOCABULARY WORDS AND STORIES THAT TAUGHT GOOD BEHAVIOR.
IF THERE WERE NOT ENOUGH PRIMERS, STUDENTS LEARNED FROM A HORNBOOK. A HORNBOOK WAS A WOODEN PADDLE THAT HELD A PIECE OF PAPER ON EACH SIDE. A SEE-THROUGH SHEET OF ANIMAL HORN COVERED THE PAPERS, WHICH WERE PRINTED WITH LESSONS. THIS PROTECTED THEM SO THEY COULD BE STUDIED OVER AND OVER.
THE TEACHER MADE PENS FOR STUDENTS OUT OF GOOSE FEATHERS. ONE END OF THE FEATHER WAS SHARPENED WITH A KNIFE AND DIPPED IN INK FOR WRITING. IT COULD TAKE TWO HOURS TO MAKE ENOUGH PENS FOR THE WHOLE CLASS. PIONEERS MADE THEIR OWN INK BY MIXING INK POWDER, VINEGAR, AND WATER. |