Just in time for the Thanksgiving holiday, and part of our rotating encore feature this week, Prof. Thomas Kidd (Baylor University) returns to our podcast series to cover the history of a group of religious dissenters known as the Pilgrims.  After Tony attempts to recite a rather famous poem about the Pilgrims, we explore the roots of this group dating back to the English Reformation and how dissent within the Church of England in the 16th century set a group of individuals from Scrooby, England on a journey that would eventually land them on Plymouth Rock.  We follow the Pilgrims to the Netherlands and talk about their experiences there and discuss the reasons why they were able to obtain a charter for settlement in the North American colonies of Britain.  Prof. Kidd details the importance of the Mayflower Compact and what life was like for settlers in a new land, including a tangential discussion on the importance of beer to the Puritans.  (You will want to hear how brewing was beneficial to the Puritans and why the Puritans were not as prudish as one might think.)  We finish our podcast with Prof. Kidd’s thoughts on the legacy of the Pilgrims for American development and a brief history of the holiday we have come to know as Thanksgiving.  This podcast serves as a great introduction or review of the Pilgrims for high schoolers and homeschoolers and we encourage you to bring it to the attention of all those who might be interested.  Prof. Kidd is associate professor of history at Baylor University, senior fellow at Baylor’s Institute for Studies of Religion, and co-director of Baylor’s Program on Historical Studies of Religion.  Recorded: October 5, 2010.

RELATED LINKS

Thomas Kidd’s bio at Baylor University’s Department of History.

Baylor’s Institute for Studies of Religion.

American Colonial History: Clashing Cultures and Faiths, by Thomas Kidd.

George Whitefield: America’s Spiritual Founding Father, by Thomas Kidd.

Baptists in America: A History, by Thomas Kidd and Barry Hankins.

The Great Awakening: The Roots of Evangelical Christianity in Colonial America, by Thomas Kidd.

God of Liberty: A Religious History of the American Revolution, by Thomas Kidd.

Benjamin Franklin: The Religious Life of a Founding Father, by Thomas Kidd.

RELATED PODCASTS

Tracy McKenzie on the First Thanksgiving.

Thomas Kidd on the Great Awakening.

Evan Haefeli on the Dutch Origins of Religious Liberty.

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