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Chapter 5: Beginnings of an American Identity
Chapter Guiding Essential Question: What traditions, events, and forces helped
form an American identity?
Section 1: Early American Culture
Section Essential Questions:
1.
2.
3.
4.
I.
II.
How did the American colonies differ from older societies?
What was life like in the colonies?
How did the Great Awakening change American society?
How did the Enlightenment influence the colonists?
A New Kind of Society – British culture slowly became an American identity
as colonists adapted their old ways to a new world
A. Land, Wealth, and Rights
1. Land was plentiful after taken from Native Americans (unlike
Europe)
2. More land meant more people could vote than in Britain.
B. Social Mobility
1. America unlike Europe in its social class system
2. No titled aristocracy (No Dukes, Earls, Sirs, etc.)
3. A Large Middle Class
4. Huge underclass of slaves
5. Poor could much more easily rise to middle class
Colonial Life – Most Americans lived on farms
A. The Working World
1. Farming women: cooked, churned butter, made soap, candles,
and clothes; tended the garden, looked after farm animals
2. Town & City women: did much of farming life, but sometimes
practiced trades
3. Women could not vote, could not own property without
husband/s permission
III.
4. Farming men: worked outdoors, planted, raised and harvested
crops and then sold the surplus
5. Cared for livestock, butchered, and cut firewood
B. Life of the Young
1. Six to eight children per family; more children meant more
workers
2. By six, boys were expected to help their fathers with work
3. Around 13, many boys became apprentices for 4-7 years
4. Apprentice: one who is learning a trade from an experienced
craftsperson
5. Girls learned sewing and household skills from their mothers
C. Education and Literacy
1. Colonial America had high literacy rate, or the ability to read
and write
a) England: 60% of men, New England 85% of white men
b) Middle Colonies: 65% of white men, South: 50%
2. Children taught to read the Bible
D. Colonial Literature
1. Ben Franklin published Poor Richard’s Almanac in 1732 (“A
penny saved is a penny earned,” “By failing to prepare, you are
preparing to fail,” “Honesty is the best policy”)
E. A Growing Diversity – Diversity: variety
1. Different ethnic groups, races, and nationalities were colonists
Religious Revival
A. The Great Awakening – 1730s and 1740s
1. Great Awakening: a Christian religious revival
2. Traveling preachers preached that inner religious emotion was
more important than outward religious behavior
3. Jonathon Edwards: preacher who delivered fiery sermons
during the Great Awakening
4. Spiritual renewal or rebirth begins in American culture
B. Religion and Social Change
IV.
1. African Americans and Native Americans began to be baptized
and start their own churches
2. George Whitefield: preacher who drew thousands of people
with his sermons and raised funds to start a home for orphans
3. Great Awakening encouraged colonists to challenge authority
and question traditional religious practices
The Enlightenment: philosophical movement stressing human reason
A. Belief in Progress
1. Valued justice and equality
2. Scientists discovered natural laws of the universe
3. John Locke: English philosopher who argued that people have
natural rights
a) Didn’t believe kings should rule
b) Everyone had a right to life, liberty, and property
4. Through the Enlightenment and Great Awakening, people
began to see the British government as a threat to their rights and
freedoms
Section 2: Roots of American Democracy
Section Essential Questions:
5. How were English rights strengthened over the centuries?
6. How were colonial rights affected by political changes?
V.
VI.
The Rights of Englishmen – colonists enjoyed the same rights as English
since they were English subjects; most advanced political democracy in
Europe
A. Justice and Self-Government
1. Magna Carta: charter of English political and civil liberties
a) King John forced to sign in 1215
b) Guaranteed rights to nobles and freemen
c) Property could not be seized by king
d) Could not be taxed without a council of prominent men
agreeing to it
e) Prominent: important and well-known
f) Trial by jury of their social peers
B. Parliament and Colonial Government
1. Parliament: England’s chief lawmaking body
a) House of Commons: elected representatives
b) House of Lords: non-elected nobles, judges, and clergy
2. Colonies formed their own elected assemblies, or smaller
versions of the House of Commons
3. House of Burgesses in Virginia (1st colonial assembly)
English Rights Threatened
A. Kings Limit Self-Government
1. King Charles II and King James limited self-government by
ending representative assemblies in New England
2. Dominion of New England: King James combined
Massachusetts and other Northern colonies together
3. Edmund Andros: English governor appointed to rule the
reorganized northern colonies; jailed protestors
B. William and Mary Restore English Rights
1. Glorious Revolution: events of 1688-1689, during which the
English Parliament invited William and Mary to replace James II as
monarchs
2. English Bill of Rights: 1689 laws protecting the rights of English
subjects and Parliament
a) Parliament controlled taxation
b) No excessive fines or cruel punishments
c) People could complain without being arrested (free speech)
C. Colonists Claim English Rights
1. People in Boston jailed Governor Andros and asked Parliament
to restore their rights
2. Royal governor put in charge, but assemblies allowed
3. During early 1700s, the colonies were mostly left alone by
England
D. Zenger and Freedom of the Press
1. John Peter Zenger: New York publisher who was taken to court
for criticizing the governor of New York
2. Zenger’s paper claimed the governor accepted bribes
3. It was illegal to criticize the king in print
4. Trial concluded that people had the right to speak the truth, so
it wasn’t illegal to criticize the governor
5. Established a colonial heritage of the freedom of the press
6. Heritage: tradition
Section 3: The French and Indian War
Section Essential Questions:
7. Why were Native Americans involved in conflicts between Europeans?
8. What alliances fought in the French and Indian War?
9. How did the French and Indian War change the colonial world?
VII.
VIII.
Europeans in Native American Lands
A. France Claims Western Lands
1. French claimed the Ohio River valley, Mississippi River valley
and the Great Lakes region as well as the territory of Louisiana
2. New France – all of the above lands combined
B. Native American Alliances
1. English and French both used Native Americans to help supply
furs
2. Dragged their trading partners into their wars, too
War Begins and Spreads – both French and English wanted the strategic
Ohio River Valley in western PA
A. War in the Ohio River Valley
1. French built forts to protect the land (Fort Duquesne)
2. Virginia governor sent 21-year-old George Washington in 1753
to tell the French to leave
a) French told him they wouldn’t leave
b) Washington built Fort Necessity – later destroyed
c) Battle of Jumonville Glenn, won by Washington
3. French and Indian War had begun
4. French and Indian War: war of 1754-1763 between Britain,
France, and their allies for control of North America
5. Albany Plan of Union: first formal proposal to unite colonies
a) Suggested by Ben Franklin
b) Grand Council would collect taxes, raise armies, and make
treaties
c) Failed since colonies didn’t want to give up own power
IX.
B. Braddock’s Defeat
1. Braddock and 2,100 redcoats (British soldiers) along with
Washington were ambushed near Fort Duquesne
2. Entire office corps except Washington killed
C. Quebec Falls
1. New secretary of state William Pitt borrowed huge sums of
money to send more troops and better generals to North America
2. Battle of Quebec: battle that led to the British victory in the
French and Indian War
3. General Wolfe (British) vs. General Montcalm (French)
4. Wolfe and 4,000 of his men scaled 300 feet of cliffs to attack
Quebec and won the battle
5. Spain made a pact to aid France; too little, too late
6. Pact: formal agreement; a bargain
7. Treaty of Paris (1763): treaty that ended the war between
France and Britain (France gone from North America, Britain gain
much land)
The New Colonial World
A. Pontiac’s Rebellion: Native American revolt against the British colonies
1. Named after the Ottawa war leader Pontiac
2. Native Americans destroyed British forts and surrounded all of
the others
3. British defeated the Native Americans by giving them smallpox infected blankets as gifts
4. Smallpox: highly infectious and often fatal disease
5. Proclamation of 1763: British declaration that forbade
colonists from settling west of the Appalachians (so they wouldn’t
anger Native Americans)
B. A New Colonial Identity
1. Colonists angry over Proclamation of 1763; they wanted the
new land
2. Whole conflict helped to unite the colonies