middletowneye

The presentation will begin with an overview of contact and trade relations between Native Americans and English colonists in the northeast during the early 1600s, including the Pequots’ invitation for English to settle in the Connecticut Valley. Then, the talk will turn specifically to the relations between the Wongunks and the English in Middletown, known at the time as Mattabesecke. Here, the two groups chose to “sit down together,” with an outcome very different from that in Wethersfield a decade or so earlier.

Mr. Sarbaugh graduated from Wesleyan University, where he majored in anthropology. He has studied various aspects of Native American culture, language, economy, and trade from the colonial period to the present. For many years, he worked closely with Wesleyan Professor of Anthropology Willard Walker, researching and writing about Cherokees, with particular focus on their adoption of a natively invented writing system in the 1820s. Professor Walker died in May 2009.

First Church of Christ, Congregational (UCC) is the local church that traces its roots directly back to the Middletown’s original Puritan settlers in 1650. This Second Hour presentation will follow the 10 a.m. worship service. The public is warmly invited to either or both of these events. For more information, call 860-346-6657 ext. 13.