Work in the Colonial Era

CodCod Gadus morhua

A food fish of the cool water of the North Atlantic: Gadus morhua. The species that was the major attraction for European fishermen to come to America. The stock is now severely overfished with total collapse and closing of the famous cod fishing grounds off of Newfoundland. fishing brought people to the Penobscot Bay area, even before the PlymouthPlymouth Colony

Founded in December 1620 at what is now Plymouth, Massachusetts by English Separatist Puritans. colonizers began fishing here in the late 1620s. Cod provided colonists with a product to pay for goods not available in America. Most colonists were seasonal saltwater farmers and fishermen.

In the seventeenth century, fashionable and prosperous Europeans wore fur, such as beaver and fox. Hats made of feltedFelt

Fibers that are matted together, not woven, by heat, moisture, and/or pressure. Felts are used in paper making, and felted beaver fur hats were popular in seventeenth and eighteenth century Europe, encouraging the North American fur trade. beaver fur were very popular, and Europeans had depleted their own beaver supply. Settlers both trapped and traded for furs with Native Americans. Like the West Coast fur trade of the early nineteenth century, this was a profitable business.

A need for fishing and coasting vessels provided the impetus for the growth of shipbuilding in the colonial era, which also saw some vessels built for transatlantic carriage.