Christmas with the Puritans: A Festive Program at the Congregational Library & Archives

This program celebrated the Christmas season by exploring the history of puritan objections to this holiday. Puritans famously banned Christmas in Massachusetts in 1659, and they are often portrayed as joyless, solemn, and severe. However, we don’t often hear a nuanced explanation of their grievances with Christmas or the more complicated history of their influence on early American culture.

Did seventeenth-century puritans really hate holiday fun, or are they misunderstood? In this talk and collections tour, Dr. Tricia Peone examined rare manuscripts and books in the CLA’s collection and discussed how Christmas was celebrated (and not celebrated) in early New England. Attendees learned more about Christmas in seventeenth-century New England and the evolution of the holiday into the one we know today.

SPEAKER BIO

Dr. Tricia Peone joined the CLA in 2022 as the Project Director for New England’s Hidden Histories. Prior to joining the CLA, she was a research scholar at Historic New England for the Recovering New England’s Voices project. She has also previously worked as the public programs director at New Hampshire Humanities, a university lecturer teaching classes on the Salem witch trials, early New England, and public history, and as a researcher for cultural heritage organizations. Her scholarship focuses on early New England, particularly the history of magic and witchcraft, and her work on these subjects has appeared in journals, books, blogs, and on radio and television. She holds a PhD in history from the University of New Hampshire with a specialization in the early modern Atlantic world and history of science.