Summer gatherings also offered an occasion for contest in markmanship, footracing, and swimming. Wherever the Nipmucks camped, they organized work along gender lines. Women had primary responsibility for raising the children and feeding the family. They prepared and stored food for the winter. When they had time, they made themselves beads and other articles of jewelery.
Women also wove baskets and brooms and gathered wood for the fire.
To Englishmen's astonishment, Nipmuch women built and transported their families' wigwams from place to place. Englishmen felt sorry for Indian women, but Englishwomen protested that they worked just as hard. Although native men enjoyed more leisure time than Englishmen, the former took ample care of their families' needs. In addition to hunting adn fishing, Nipmuck men fabricated the tools associated with these occupations, as well as other ceremonial objects such as pipes and totem poles. Nipmucks usually buried men and women with the implements they made and used during their lifetimes.