Taking the kids: America's Historic Triangle

(Tribune Media Services) -- The young boys traveled thousands of miles from their families on a harrowing five-month sea journey not knowing what they'd find when they arrived. Talk about being scared out of your wits. Talk about an adventure of a lifetime!

Not some school exchange or summer program, the arduous voyage was history in the making, the brave young boys sailing from England to the New World on a 144-day journey, settlers of Jamestown, Virginia. It couldn't have been easy on the boat (what did they do all day?) or when they arrived in 1607. Within a year, two-thirds of the settlers died from hunger, disease or Indian attack.

Move over Pilgrims, it's time to give Jamestown its due, including the youngest settlers. May 14, 2007 marked the 400th anniversary of the founding of Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement in the Americas, and it was celebrated with great fanfare -- even Queen Elizabeth II came calling. And the celebrating will continue throughout the year.

The men who settled Jamestown, ultimately leaving us the legacy of free enterprise, representative government and cultural diversity, arrived 13 years before the Pilgrims. But, according to National Geographic writer Karen Lange, author of the new children's book "1607: A New Look at Jamestown," "adults and kids don't seem to know too much about it, unless they're from Virginia. There was always so much more emphasis on the Pilgrims."

And what they do know -- the story of Pocahantas, the daughter of the Powhatan chief, and John Smith -- is mostly wrong. No, they were not lovers, says Anne Price-Hardister who oversees education programming for Jamestown Settlement and Yorktown Victory Center. In fact, Pocahantas ended up marrying another Englishman, John Rolfe, traveled to England, had a son, Thomas, and died at age 20 before she could return to Virginia. Her son eventually did return, Price-Hardister said, and raised a family here.

There are new interactive indoor and outdoor exhibits and programs throughout what's known as America's Historic Triangle that expounds on Pocahantas' story and more.

"The idea is to learn by experience," Hardister explains, teaching kids about the African American, Native American and English settlers' experience. For example, kids can dig out a Powhatan canoe, try on battle armor, climb into a sailor's bunk on the recreated Susan Constant, Godspeed and Discovery, the ships that brought settlers here, play corn cob darts or make rope or corn cakes.

They can even try trading with those who can't speak their language or understand their culture and see for themselves what the archeologists have unearthed at historic Jamestowne, the site of the original fort, (www.historicjamestown.org).

Nearby at Yorktown Victory Center (www.historyisfun.org), kids can try on 18th-century clothes and crawl into a tent, visit the surgeon (check out the tools for pulling teeth) at the recreated Continental Army Encampment, or help out in the garden at the 1780s farm. Next time the kids gripe about making their beds or doing their homework, remind them how hard they would have had to work if they'd grown up on an 18th-century farm.

Visit the Yorktown Battlefield and Visitor Center (www.nps.gov/yonb). The siege of Yorktown effectively ended the Revolutionary War.

Less than 10 miles away at Colonial Williamsburg, once the capital of the most influential state of the 18th century, kids can travel back in time to the eve of the American Revolution in the richest, oldest, and largest colony, to learn what it was like to be an 18th-century kid, whether slave, gentry or farmer, and interact with junior interpreters as they play 18th-century games (hoops anybody?), work in the fields or march with the Army.

Visitors can do everything from make bricks, feed animals, cook, go to a ball or work as a carpenter's assistant.

"Young people learn a lot easier from people their own age," says former fourth-grade teacher Katrina White-Comissiong who works at the completely interactive Great Hopes Plantation site at Colonial Williamsburg (www.history.org).

Here youngsters can talk to the young interpreters about what it was like to be a young slave, (African Americans represented 52 percent of the population and most were slaves) as they join them in the fields, make toys or stir pots of hominy. (Stay four nights at a Williamsburg hotel and get free length-of-stay tickets.)

I've been here many times, including with little girls clutching their Felicity American Girl doll and the books that depict her life growing up in Colonial Williamsburg (www.americangirl.com) -- and I am convinced that the Historic Triangle is one vacation locale that can appeal to everyone who would like the chance to time travel through history. Where else can you talk politics with Thomas Jefferson or help raise the Liberty Pole? Just plan for plenty of pool time because the temperatures can soar.

Vacationing parents should also rest assured that the kids will be too busy to realize they're getting an American history lesson more powerful than anything they've learned in school -- and one they likely won't ever forget. Even better, when the kids clamor for some 21st-century fun, Busch Gardens Europe (with the world's tallest and first floorless dive coaster, http://www.buschgardens.com/BGW/, and Water Country USA (with plenty of waterslides and the Kritter Korral water play area for the littlest park goers, www.watercountryusa.com) are nearby.

Get 7-1 Williamsburg Flex Tickets -- $161 for adults, $127 for kids, free for kids under six -- that are good for seven consecutive day admissions to the historic sites, www.visitwilliamsburg.com, as well as the theme and water parks. Parking for Busch Gardens and water Country USA is included.

"Teaching kids history is not easy," acknowledges Williamsburg's Katrina White-Comissiong. "Here you can show them that history can be fun."

See you in the vegetable garden!

(For more Taking the Kids, visit www.takingthekids.com, where Eileen Ogintz welcomes your questions and comments.) E-mail to a friend

(For more Taking the Kids, visit www.takingthekids.com, where Eileen Ogintz welcomes your questions and comments.)

Copyright 2007 EILEEN OGINTZ, DISTRIBUTED BY TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.

All About Colonial Williamsburg • Jamestown • Yorktown