Jamestown 400, the celebration of the 400th anniversary of the founding of Jamestown, Virginia in 1607, happened last month on the three days of May 11, 12 and 13, 2007. According to organizers and the popular press, it was a great success.

Although the event had many positive aspects, in fact I think it failed miserably in meeting what should have been its two primary objectives: sell all the 90,000 available tickets, and tell the real story of Jamestown. How is that possible? Read on.

First, sell all the tickets. The event could handle 30,000 participants per day for three days. According to press reports, the actual results were: 16,500 on Friday, 27,400 on Saturday, and 22,000 on Sunday, for a total of 65,900, not 90,000. Later press reports hinted strongly that even those “reported actuals” were high.

How could an event on which hundreds of millions of dollars had been lavished fail to meet these very modest targets? The main problem was that the event organizers, Jamestown 2007, failed to understand their audience. The natural primary audience for such an event was the heritage, genealogical and historical community, not the general public. Early in the planning, the Jamestown 2007 organizers liaised briefly with the Jamestowne Society, the prestigious society (of which I am a proud member) that is comprised of the proven descendants of the actual early settlers of the town. According to my sources in the Society, the Jamestown 2007 planners broke off contact when the Society pushed for more focus on the actual settlers and their descendants.

The Jamestowne Society is not large, at 6700 members, but the overall heritage, history and genealogical community is huge. The famous Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) alone has 168,000 members (who influence the travel plans of roughly 300,000+ households, including grandchildren and other relatives). Then there are the 70-odd other heritage organizations (ranging from the prestigious First Families of Virginia to the fun Descendants of Pirates and Privateers), who probably influence another 200,000 households. (For more information on these societies, see www.hereditary.us.) The hobby of genealogy is often rated as one of the top two hobbies in the country, with estimates of participants well into the tens of millions of persons. Many of these persons have high disposable incomes, extensive leisure time, and a very passionate interest in their subject. What did the organizers do to reach out to this obvious community? According to my sources, worse than nothing. They got into disputes with the Jamestowne Society, initially hired a northerner as director who didn’t know the Pilgrims from the Jamestowne settlers, didn’t target their ads or mailings to the historical community, and planned events (like rhythm and blues concerts) that would not appeal to this core audience and had no relation to the history of Jamestown. Incredibly, they failed to put any representatives from the hereditary society community on any of their advisory committees or planning boards. I personally experienced some of these problems when three years ago I tried to offer suggestions to the organizers on how the numerous hereditary societies that link back to Jamestown could be involved in a parade of flags and societies, wreath layings, and other commemorative activities. My suggestions, phone calls and emails were ignored.

Assume that 10 million households in America, with 40 million people, have a decision-maker really interested in history and genealogy. If this community, instead of the general public, had been the primary marketing focus, and if only half of one percent of these people had showed up, attendance would have been 200,000, not 65,900.

Second, tell the true story of Jamestown. The real significance of Jamestown is that this was the place where representative democracy began in America, where entrepreneurship began (in the form of the private Virginia Company, which founded the colony), where the spread of the English language across America and the globe began, and where our modern culture first gained a successful foothold in the New World. Sounds obvious enough. But the organizers did not understand this simple, inspiring and obvious message. Apparently they were totally caught up in the current fashion for teaching American history, where all “old dead white guys” are seen as boring figures to be criticized or ridiculed.

In a bizarre form of reverse racism, most of the message and marketing for Jamestown 400 focused on the Indian and African slave point of view, and failed to tell the proud and glorious story of the individual (white) English men, women and children actually founded the town, and who fought, starved and died to see the great experiment succeed. The tone of the much of the marketing was apologetic and negative. But no one pays money or drives hundreds of miles to hear an apology. We all want to be uplifted and positive, and to celebrate the lives and success stories of early Americans, not wallow in negativity. Of course I agree that now we can look back on Jamestown as the place where English, African and American Indian cultures came together, mingled and eventually created a diverse whole greater than the sum of its parts. But don’t portray this as negative, and don’t blame any of the three parties. That is historically stupid and wrong. Most importantly, it doesn’t sell tickets.

Will we ever get the true meaning of Jamestowne right? In 2057 the 450th anniversary will be celebrated. I will be 107 years old. I’m not holding my breath.

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Lew Toulmin is a proven descendant of Lt. Col. Thomas Ligon and Benjamin Harrison, and about twenty other early pioneers of early Jamestowne. He lives in Silver Spring, Maryland.

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