Salem Witch Trials focus of virtual talk hosted by W.T. Library

LONG VALLEY - On Wednesday, October 14 at 7 p.m., Washington Township Public Library will host Salvatore Prisco, Ph.D., for a virtual lecture entitled "Psycho-Social Factors in the Salem Witchcraft Hysteria."

Various explanations have been given for the Salem witch trials: tensions between a declining landed gentry and a rising mercantile elite; a possible LSD-like substance in contaminated grain; long, cold Puritan winters without holidays or celebrations; the King James translation of the Bible that introduced the concept of witches in the Hebrew text; a smallpox epidemic, and Massachusetts losing its colonial charter in 1691 to the English royal crown. However, the events that took twenty lives for the "crime" of witchcraft more than 300 years ago was the result of conflict between parents and adolescents in the rigid and repressive Puritan society, combined
with the introduction of Caribbean slaves who brought with them stories of voodoo, spells, and demons. Human imagination did the rest.

Dr. Salvatore Prisco is tenured faculty in history at the University of Alabama, 1969-1974; tenured faculty at Stevens Institute of Technology, N.J. 1974-2011 and Chair, Dept. of Humanities, Professor of Humanities, Director, Division of Humanities and Social Sciences.

This program will be held live over Zoom. Registration is required so we can send you a link to attend. Click here to sign up.