Elizabeth Lindsay, age 13, of Butte, Mont., for her question:

WHO WAS MASSASOIT?

When the Pilgrims settled at Plymouth, Mass., in 1620, they were on the land of the Wampanoag Indians. Chief of the Wampanoag tribe was a man named Massasoit.

Massasoit ruled the area that is now Cape Cod and Rhode Island. In the spring of 1621 he visited the Pilgrims and signed a peace treaty with them. In the year that followed, Massasoit helped the Pilgrims often by selling them food when they needed it. Massasoit and his braves were the guests of the Pilgrims when they celebrated their first Thanksgiving in November of 1621.

As long as Massasoit lived, there was peace and friendship between the Pilgrim settlers and the Wampanoag Indians. But after Massasoit's death, his son, King Philip, was afraid the white men would take all the Indian lands. He led what was called the King Philip's War (1675 1676). The Indian tribes ware almost completely destroyed and many settlers were killed.