11/05/2026
***November is National Native American Heritage Month and an important opportunity in this week's History Note to remember the Indigenous people who inhabited the land we now call Longmeadow.***
For thousands of years, the Kwinitekw River Valley was inhabited by Algonquian people distributed across several horticultural communities: Agawam, Nonotuck, Pocumtuck, Quaboag, Sokoki, and Woronoco. The Agawam lived on both sides of the river near modern-day Springfield, and their lifeways included hunting, farming, and fishing. Seasonal changes dictated the movements and practices of Algonquian language tribes like the Agawam. The river provided a variety of fish and a habitat for mammals like beaver whose fur was a prized commodity in both Indigenous and European markets; the soil was good for the growing of crops like corn, beans, and squash; forests were a rich source of nuts and berries, small and large game and birds for hunting, and timber. On the eastern bank of the Connecticut River was a marshy floodplain that they called “masacksic,” roughly translated to the “long meadow.” The Agawam people used the meadow for a variety of purposes, including the cultivation of cranberries.
In the 17th century, the arrival of Europeans in the area forever changed the way of life in the valley. A smallpox outbreak in 1634 triggered by the arrival of Dutch traders killed a devastating number of Native people across the region, including many Agawam. Soon after, English settlers arrived from the east part of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, led by William Pynchon of Roxbury. Pynchon traveled west in hopes of profiting from the fur trade, in which Native trappers provided extremely valuable beaver furs in exchange for various European goods.
On July 15, 1636, Pynchon signed an agreement with the Agawam for land on both sides of the river. The 1636 deed incorporated the Algonquian language and bore the names and marks of more than a dozen Agawam natives. The deed ensured the Agawams’ continued rights: “they shall have and enjoy al that Cotinackeesh [an Agawam word for cultivated ground], or ground that is now planted; And have liberty to take Fish and Deer, ground nuts, walnuts, akornes, and saschiminesh or a kind of pease, And also if any of our cattle spoile their corne, to pay as it is worth; & that hogs shall not goe on the side of Agaam but in akorne time.” This deed contains the first known written reference to Longmeadow, “the Masaksicke,” which was purchased for “four fathom of wampum, four coats, four hatchets, four hoes, and four knives.”
The larger settlement, first called Agawam Plantation, was eventually renamed “Springfield.” The Agawam were a common sight in Longmeadow for decades; several land sales between colonists during the mid-17th century mention that the Agawams’ right to cultivate cranberries in the floodplain would not be infringed. However, explosive growth in the lucrative fur trade swiftly tilted the balance of power.
Today it is important to recognize that deeds such as the one signed between Pynchon and Agawam leaders may not have been balanced as appears on paper. Per historian Margaret Bruchac, “Indian deeds are often cited as evidence of the sale of land, but it’s doubtful that these documents were ever viewed by Native signers as quit-claims. In practice, they were negotiated like treaties and temporary joint use agreements, confirmed by the exchange of gifts, and reserved Native rights to hunt, plant, set up wigwams, etc. on land that was supposedly ‘sold.’”
The several decades of general peace between the English and the Agawam came to an end with King Philip’s War (1675-1676), an era of violent encounters between various Mohican and Algonquian language tribes and the English settlers in Massachusetts that cast a dark shadow over the relationship between the Agawam and English settlers in Springfield. The kin and descendants of the Agawam persist today among a variety of extant tribes, including the Nipmuc Nation of Central Massachusetts and the Abenaki peoples of Northern New England.
Sources:
1988 Plan for Historic Preservation produced for the Longmeadow Historical Society and the Town of Longmeadow. Revised and updated in 2022 by members of the Longmeadow Historical Society, with special assistance by Michael Baick, LHS Class of 2018, Harvard Class of 2022.
Bruchac, Margaret M. “Native Presence in Nonotuck and Northampton,” in Kerry W. Buckley, ed. A Place Called Paradise: Culture & Community in Northampton, Massachusetts 1654-2004 (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2004), 24.
Powers, David M. “William Pynchon, the Agawam Indians, and the 1636 Deed for Springfield.” Historical Journal of Massachusetts, Summer 2017, 45, no. 2 (n.d.): 144–67.
