After many years in Plimouth Colony, the Pilgrims, who were originally farmers, began to run out of farm land as they passed down their land to their sons with each new generation. Besides that, the soil of Plimouth was thin and rocky. The Pilgrim settlers had to finally turn to crafts and trading to make a living. They began to send their sons at the age of 13 to live with relatives or friends in a larger settlement to learn a trade. They were apprenticed to carpenters, blacksmiths, tanners, coopers, millwrights, cobblers, millers, printers, silversmiths, postriders, and others. Some girls were "bound out" to wealthy families to be seamstresses and cooks.
These trades made life easier for the settlers and as time went on the craftspeople became specialized artisans.
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