Omaha daily bee., 1909-12-20

Wherever there lives a descendant of
that brave little party of Pilgrims who
braved the psrils of an ocean voyage in a
tiny craft and faced the dangers of a
primeval country In order that they might
worship God in their own way, mex
Wednesday, December %, will be celebrated
the 2S9th anniversary Of the arrival at
Plymouth Rock. Perhaps no little boatoad
of people in the history of the world has
accomplished more, or contributed more
TO civilization than those Pilgrims. Ger
tainly the recrods OF no such small band
OF people have been better or more care
fully kept, and the fact that millions, per-
haps, claim to trace their ancestry to the
passengers Of the Mayflower bears elo-
quent witness to the honor the world be
slows upon the little band OF devout re-
ligionists.
Someone has had the patience to keep a
running account Of the furniture and other
equipment which 1t is claimed came over
in the Mayflower, and he calculates that
It would fill the holds of the Mauretalta
and the Lusitania, with a good-sized cargo
left over. And yet the Mayflower was a
boat of only $50 tons burden. So wide
spread were the claims Of ~parentage
through the Mayflowor passengers that the
General Society OF Mayflower Descend
ants was organized in 1894, for the princi-
pal purpose OF separating the true from
the false among those who claim that they
had descended from some passenger of the
Mayflower. That many false claims are
made is well known, but there are thous-
ands who can trace their ancestry through
an unbroken line Of eight or ten genera
tions back to thu Mayflower Pilgrims.
The society has done much toward check
ing the innumerable claims to Mayflower
descent. The person who desires to become
a member Of that organization, If he has
any ground for his claim, is given every
opportunity to prove his lineage, and IL
he succeeds, all is we'll; II he does not,
there is probably no color at all to his
pretensions, as the records possessed by
the society enables this matter to be de-
termined with a high degree of accuracy.
One of the most interesting things shown
by the records of the Society of Mayflower
Descendants is how generations of differ
ent families may fail to keep step with
one another. In these records one may see
as contemporaries of the same age, one
person seventh from Elder Brewster, and
another person tenth from the same Elder
Brewster. 1t is probable that the majority
of the present Mayflower descendants, so
far as membership in the society is con-
cerned, arc of the eighth generation from
the original Pilgrims, and that their chill
dren represent the ninth generation. Count
ing the average as the ninth it will be
found that the average generation since the
Mayflower is slightly over thirty-two
years.
The General Society of Mayflower De-
scendants is modelled after the plan of the
United States government State societies
may be organized wherever there are
enough MEMBERS to Justify it. They have
the privilege of enacting any rules or laws
which do not conflict with those of the
general society. They are represented In
the activities of the general organization
in proportion to their membership, and in
general bear the same relation to the gen.
eral society that the states bear oward
the federal government
One of the prominent Mayflower descend
ants says that the Pilgrims were fortunate
in their historians; that they not only made
history, but wrote it themselves, in order
that it might pass down to posterity in
proper form. To this he attributes the
advantage they ha ye in history over the
Dutch. The settlers Of New York did
things just as we'll as those at Plymouth
Rock, but they were men of silence. little
concerned about the perpetuation Of their
deeds in historical annals.
1t is recorded that the first use of the
written ballot in America was in 1923,
when the Purttans OF Salem organized
themselves into a Separatist church, and
elected their officers by ballot. Another
interesting feature about the organization
of this church is the fact that its whole
creed was told in a single sentence. 1--WE
covenant with the Lord, and with one
another, and do bind ourselves in the pres
sence of God, to walk together in all His
ways, according as He is pleased to re-
veal Himself unto us in His blessed word
of truth"
The most far-reaching result of the Pill
grims' work was the town meeting in
st'tuted by them-a typical pure democracy,
From the town meeting grew the consti-
tuition of the State of Connecticut, which
was written in the study of Parson Thomas
Hooker. 1t is claimed that from this in
strument came the germinal ideas of the
Constitution of the United States. Virginia