Plymouth Rock

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For the chicken breed, see Plymouth Rock (chicken)

Plymouth Rock, described by some as "the most disappointing landmark in America" because of its small size and poor visitor access.

Plymouth Rock is the traditional site of disembarkation of William Bradford and the Mayflower Pilgrims who founded Plymouth Colony, in what would become the United States. There is no contemporary reference to it, and it is not referred to in Bradford's journal Of Plymouth Plantation or in Mourt's Relation. The first reference to the Pilgrims landing on a rock is found one hundred years after they landed in 1620.

The location of Plymouth Rock (more specifically, Dedham granodiorite, a glacial erratic), at the foot of Cole's Hill is said to have been passed from generation to generation. In 1741, when plans were afoot to build a wharf at the site, a nonagenarian, Thomas Faunce, Elder of the church, pointed out the precise rock his father had told him was the first solid land on which the Pilgrims set foot upon their arrival in the New World. (The Pilgrims had landed first near the site of modern Truro on the tip of Cape Cod in November 1620 before disembarking to stay at Plymouth). Elder Faunce had been the town record keeper for most of his adult life and was 95 years old when he made the identification of Plymouth Rock. The rock is located about 650 feet from where it is generally accepted that the initial settlement was built.

An attempt was made by Col. Theophilus Cotton and the townspeople of Plymouth to move the rock in 1774. In the process the rock was split into two halves, and it was decided to leave the bottom portion behind at the wharf and the top half was relocated to the town's meeting-house.

Plymouth Rock now rests at sea level.

A published reference to Plymouth Rock was made by Captain William Coit in the Pennsylvania Journal of November 29, 1775, relating a story of how he brought captive British sailors ashore "upon the same rock our ancestors first trod".

The 1867 structure that housed (part of) Plymouth Rock until 1920. The gates were added after construction in response to souvenir hunters.

The upper portion of the rock was relocated from Plymouth's meeting-house to Pilgrim Hall in 1834. In 1859 the Pilgrim Society began building a Victorian canopy, designed by Hammatt Billings, at the wharf over the lower portion of the rock. Following its completion in 1867, the top of the rock was moved from Pilgrim Hall back to its original wharf location in 1880. The date "1620" was carved into the rock.

In 1920, the rock was relocated and the waterfront rebuilt to a design by noted landscape architect Arthur Shurcliff, with a waterfront promenade behind a low seawall, in such a way that when the rock was returned to its original site, it would be at water level. The care of the rock was turned over to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and a new very sober Roman Doric portico designed by McKim, Mead and White was built for viewing the tide-washed rock protected by gratings beneath the platform. The funds for the building of the new portico were raised by the National Society of Colonial Dames of America.

During the Rock's many journeys throughout the town of Plymouth numerous pieces of the Rock were taken, bought and sold. Today approximately 1/3 of the top portion remains. It is estimated that the original Rock weighed 20,000 lb. Although some documents indicate that tourists or souvenir hunters chipped it down, no pieces have been noticeably removed since 1880. Today there are pieces in Pilgrim Hall Museum as well as in the Patent Building in the Smithsonian.

Alexis De Tocqueville wrote in 1835:

This Rock has become an object of veneration in the United States. I have seen bits of it carefully preserved in several towns in the Union. Does this sufficiently show that all human power and greatness is in the soul of man? Here is a stone which the feet of a few outcasts pressed for an instant; and the stone becomes famous; it is treasured by a great nation; its very dust is shared as a relic.

In 1989 the seam over the face of Plymouth Rock was repaired as water was seeping into the old faultline. Thomas Choquette of Dartmouth, Massachusetts won the bid to do the work by offering $1.00.

The present (1920) superstructure designed by McKim, Mead, and White for the Tercentenary of Plymouth Rock

Today Plymouth Rock is managed by the Department of Conservation and Recreation for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts as part of Pilgrim Memorial State Park. From the end of May to Thanksgiving Day, Pilgrim Memorial is staffed by Park Interpreters who inform visitors of the history of Plymouth Rock and answer questions.