Guns and Gold; Faith and Food : 167 



Indians centuries before the Puritans landed on the New England 

 coast and it was the friendly Indian that taught the white man this 

 standard method of cultivation and so made possible the first cele- 

 bration of Thanksgiving. 



In Maine and on Long Island, valuable, not to say notorious, crops 

 of potatoes are being harvested and the potato also was the Indian's 

 innovation. Over and over again in the course of colonial history, 

 white colonies were saved from privation and starvation by the 

 Indian's skill in agriculture and in the domestication of native plants. 

 In many other cases, lost colonies would have been saved if they 

 had remained on friendly terms with the native inhabitants. 



The culture of edible corn and of potatoes has spread around the 

 world and they have become two of mankind's great and stable food 

 crops. To this we must add field corn which is used not only as fod- 

 der for animals but which, when ground and otherwise processed, 

 also is added to the human dietary. 



The American Indian also domesticated and added to the world's 

 dietary the following plants: many different varieties of edible beans 

 (including the lima bean), the sweet potato, the cassava (manioc), 

 pumpkins, squashes and gourds in great variety, melons, grapes from 

 several stocks of native American vines, the cacao tree which yields 

 cocoa and chocolate. Among the trees and plants that yield drugs 

 he knew about cinchona that yields quinine and the coca plant 

 that produces cocaine and he also utilized for his own purposes the 

 alkaloid of the peyote. He cultivated and used the fiber of native cot- 

 ton and spun yarn and rope from a number of other fiber yielding 

 plants. 



One would suppose that the sum of these contributions was suflS- 

 cient to have satisfied even the Indian and to have rendered the rest 

 of the world forever grateful to him. The Indian, however, was in- 

 ventive and generous to an unprecedented degree. On top of every- 

 thing else, he domesticated several different varieties of tobacco and 

 invented the solace and luxury of smoking. 



In the cultivation and utilization of plants the Indian exhibited a 

 talent that amounts almost to genius. He knew about drainage, irri- 

 gation and the need for fertilizers. It is possible also that he knew 

 something about the value of rotating crops though this latter 

 knowledge was important only in the areas of sizable settled com- 

 munities. Elsewhere there was plenty of land available and most 

 Indian tribes were mobile even where they were not nomadic. 



The discovery of America benefited the world's food supplies in two 



