48 FISHBEMEN OF THE UNITED STATES. 



B -THE SAILOR FISHERMEN OP NEW ENGLAND. 



33. SHORE EDUCATION. 



Schools and chueohes.— In the early days of the Massachusetts colonies the coast fishery 

 was one of the most important industries upon which the people relied for support. In the early 

 records of the Plymouth colony and, later, in the various town records may be found ordinances 

 for the establishment of free schools, the teachers of which were to be supported by appropriations 

 from the proceeds of certain public fishery privileges, and similar provisions were made for the 

 maintenance of " an able, godly minister," an agent of equal importance in the educational system 

 of the colonists. 



The following order is on record : 



"Whereas, at the General Court of His Majesty holden at Few Plymouth, in June, 1670, the 

 court, upon due and serious consideration, did freely give and grant all such profits as might or 

 should annually accrue to the colony, from time to time, for fishing with nets or seines at Cape 

 Cod for mackerel, bass, or herrings, * * * to be improved for and toward a free school in 

 some town." 



The^records of the Plymouth colony show that in July, 1677, the Cape Cod fishery was let for 

 seven years, at £30 per annum, to certain individuals who are named, to seine mackerel and bass. 

 They were restricted to take in the Plymouth colonists with them; and if none offer to admit 

 strangers, and a portion of the profits of the hire which accrued to the colony were distributed to 

 the schools. 



For the maintenance of a minister : 



" The first Court of Assistants, holden att Charlestown, August 23, 1630, Ordered, that M' 

 Phillips [a minister] should have allowed him 3 hogsheads of meale, 1 hogshead of malte, 4 busheUs 

 of Indean corne, 1 bushell of oatemeale, halfe an hundred of salte flshe; fbr apparell, and other 

 provisions, £20, or els to have £40 given him in money per annum to make his owne provisions if 

 hee chuse it the rather, the yeare to begin the first of September nexte."* 



In 1662 for the support of a minister in the Plymouth colony the following order was — 



"Made and concluded by the Generall Court held att Plymouth for the Jurisdiction of New 

 Plymouth the third of June Ann" 1662. The Court proposeth it as a thing they Judge would bee 

 very comendable and benificiall to the Townes where God's Providence shall cast any whales; if 

 they should agree to sett apart some part of every such fish or oyle for the Incorragement of an 

 able Godly Minnester amongst them."t 



Prom that time until now the New England coast towns, like those of the interior, have as a 

 rule been well provided with free schools. These are attended by the boys until they are old 

 enough to go to sea and by the girls until they are sixteen or seventeen years old, and sometimes 

 still longer. It is quite usual for boys to engage in fishing in summer and to attend school in 

 winter, and some do this until they arrive at the age of manhood. As a class the girls are almost 

 always better educated than the boys, and the intelligence and refinement among the women along 

 the coast, some of whom are always school teachers, seems to a stranger very noteworthy. The 

 excellent education of the wives and mothers of the fishermen cannot be without a very important 

 effect. The people of most of the fishing villages from the Bay of Fundy to New York are intel- 



* Records of Massachusetts, vol. i [1628-1641], p. 73. 



t Plymouth Colony Kecoras, vol. xi, 1623-1683, liaws, p. 135, 



