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4.2 Pilgrim Entrepreneurs and the VC's of Their Day
TheFunded.com Open Letter
Posted by Anonymous on 2009-11-23
As we prepare for another Thanksgiving, we can take comfort in the fact that VCs have long operated in new worlds...
On April 5, 1621, Governor John Carver and about 100 Pilgrims at Plymouth watched the Mayflower hoist anchors and sail from Cape Cod Bay back to England. One week later, Carver died, and the colonists elected 32-year-old William Bradford as their governor.
Here’s the part of the story that I find interesting: this next paragraph is lifted wholly unchanged from a church bulletin called "Christian History Institute’s Glimpses of people, events, life and faith from the Church across the Ages,” Issue 215:
Conditions at the new settlement were formidable. When Carver died, Bradford inherited enormous problems. Food was scarce and for several years the Pilgrims lived close to starvation. The Indians rightfully resented the encroachment on their lands, and plague broke out, killing more than half the Pilgrims the first winter. There were quarrels with “strangers” in their midst. The “adventurers” (venture capitalists) who funded the expedition made unreasonable demands, quarreled among themselves in England, and forced the small colony to live for several years under a system which could never work. Enemies from England imposed upon their Christian charity.
Let us give thanks that we have survived encounters with “adventurers” this year.
