A Voyage Long and Strange: Going Beyond Pilgrims and Plymouth Rock

By Breanne Boland May 29, 2008 Issue

It’s either utterly bizarre or perfectly fitting that our guide to the earliest, least discussed part of American history is a man whose family has only been in the U.S. for three generations. Tony Horwitz, historian, writer, and Jew, is an informed and engaging tour guide, bringing a fresh perspective to several centuries of history fueled by greed, religious intolerance, and the occasional bit of pure bloodlust.

Most people, particularly Floridians, know that there were some European goings-on in North America before the Pilgrims limped onto the shores of New England. However, the ritual of Thanksgiving and the symbols of turkeys, muskets, and hats with big buckles have overshadowed all that, making us feel like America was born when Squanto joined the religious refugees for the first organized meal of turkey and stuffing.

Decidedly not true, though. As one of Horwitz’s interviewees says, “The Virginia story is a lot more exciting, but as a founding myth it’s a lousy fit. No one wants to build a national story around a man killing and eating his pregnant wife, or colonists too lazy to grow their own food. Shiftlessness isn’t part of the American self-image.”

Horwitz is a historian, and he realized one day that he had almost no idea about that long period between Columbus sailing the ocean blue and the activities around Plymouth Rock. They weren’t covered up, but they weren’t feted in rhymes or holidays either. He embarked on a road trip to the sites of North America’s earliest colonies, a trip that takes him to Newfoundland, the Southwest, Florida, Virginia, and to many other historical sites across the United States. From the first campsites of the Norse explorers from Greenland to the remains of Jamestown, Horwitz looks at the remains of settlements, if there are any, and investigates what effect this history has on the people and places that surround them.

Modern day interviews and less-discussed history weave together to make A Voyage Long and Strange. Horwitz has a knack for wheedling interviews from odd and reticent subjects, such as the survivors of decimated Native American tribes, or jaded historical reenactors. He details the many waves of Spanish attempts at colonization, the repeated failure to thrive of many groups from many nations, and he decodes period art and explains what we know of what actually happened. As it turns out, despite not having a rich oral storytelling tradition, a lot of truth has been lost in translation over the last 500 years.

Horwitz balances facts and hilarious details, making for a straightforward telling that doesn’t dwell in the bolded vocabulary words of your junior high history class. Despite being relatively short, ours is a rich and, yes, strange history full of gold-seekers and cultural clashes, martyrs, and selective memory. He tells the truth of John Smith and Pocahontas, examines the hero-worship of Spanish descendants, and presents the story of the Pilgrims in context with the by then long tradition of colonists struggling and often dying on our unfamiliar shores.

For me at least, it was easy to zone out in junior high and high school among all the talk of trade and the different religious sects of 1500s Europe. Horwitz brings the individual characters to life, pulling from their personal journals and other primary sources to examine the motivations and limitations of each early explorer. He goes beyond trends in history to see all perspectives; rather than stopping at “The Spanish were heroes” or “The Europeans perpetuated a centuries-long genocide,” he interviews and researches his way to a well-rounded point of view, making his only personal angle one of boundless curiosity with a healthy sprinkling of skepticism.

It’s easy, especially if you live in a younger area of the U.S., to think of the country’s history as being mostly limited to what you’ve heard the most about. A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World goes deeper and wider than many textbooks, striking a balance between pedantic detail and featureless overviews to make our history what it is: a lengthy, often crazy tale full of colorful characters and events that continue to shape our world today, whether we recognize it or not.

A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World, 445 pages, Henry Holt and Company. Available at bookstores, libraries, and online booksellers.

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