Jamestown often gets a bad rap. Some folks see consider it representative of the dark side of English settlement in North America, its wealth-seeking settlers contrasted with the God-seeking Puritans of New England. It's no accident that the Puritans are honored with the celebration of Thanksgiving every year, while the Jamestown settlers get... what again, exactly?

But as we emphasize here, a more complex vision prompted the founding of the Virginia colony than is usually acknowledged. And even though the colony did adopt some horrific practices, it also provided its hardscrabble immigrants, at least for a time, with the sort of opportunity and mobility that we have later come to celebrate as the “American Dream.”