<P> Some Wampanoag have been working on a language revival since 1993 . The Wôpanâak (Wampanoag) Language Reclamation Project is a collaboration of several tribes and bands led by Jessie Little Doe Baird . They have taught a few children who have become the first speakers of Wôpanâak in more than 100 years . The project is training teachers to reach more children and to develop a curriculum for a Wôpanâak - based school . Baird has compiled a 10,000 - word dictionary from university collections of colonial documents in Wôpanâak, as well as a grammar, collections of stories, and other books . </P> <P> Early contacts between the Wampanoag and colonists date from the 16th century when European merchant vessels and fishing boats traveled along the coast of New England . Captain Thomas Hunt captured several Wampanoag in 1614 and sold them in Spain as slaves . A Patuxet named Tisquantum (or Squanto) was bought by Spanish monks who attempted to convert him before setting him free . He accompanied an expedition to Newfoundland as an interpreter, then made his way back to his homeland in 1619--only to discover that the entire Patuxet tribe had died in an epidemic . </P> <P> In 1620, the Pilgrims arrived in Plymouth, and Tisquantum and other Wampanoag taught them how to cultivate the varieties of corn, squash, and beans (the Three Sisters) that flourished in New England, as well as how to catch and process fish and collect seafood . They enabled the Pilgrims to survive their first winters, and Squanto lived with them and acted as a middleman between them and Massasoit, the Wampanoag sachem . </P> <P> The Wampanoag suffered from an epidemic between 1616 and 1619, long thought to be smallpox introduced by contact with Europeans . However, researchers published a study in 2010 suggesting that the epidemic was leptospirosis, or 7 - day fever . The groups most devastated by the illness were those who had traded heavily with the French, leading to speculation that the disease was a virgin soil epidemic . Alfred Crosby has speculated that the population losses were as high as 90 percent among the Massachusett and mainland Pokanoket . </P>

Who was the member of the wampanoag tribe who helped the pilgrims grow key wampanoag crops