ALEXANDRIA, Va.—The Godspeed welcomed the public aboard yesterday, and a long birthday celebration for the nation began.

Thousands came to the Old Town Waterfront to kick off the Jamestown 2007 commemoration with music, exhibits and tours of a reproduction of one of the three ships that made the voyage leading to North America’s first permanent English settlement.

Jamestown 2007 Inc. and the city of Alexandria held a Landing Party Festival to mark the beginning of the Godspeed’s East Coast tour and the start of the 18-month commemoration.

The organization bills the slate of events as “America’s 400th Anniversary,” with the centerpiece being the May 11-13, 2007, celebration in Jamestown, Williamsburg and Yorktown.

Anniversary officials tout Jamestown as the origin of America’s brand of free enterprise, representative government, exploration and cultural diversity.

Del. Vincent F. Callahan Jr., R-Fairfax, hailed the English settlement as an event that brought Europeans, Africans and American Indians together who “would ultimately, though at times painfully, forge the world’s greatest democracy.”

Callahan, a member of the Jamestown 2007 Steering Committee, opened the event with remarks, along with U.S. Sen. John W. Warner, R-Va.; U.S. Rep. James P. Moran, D-8th; and others.

City resident Della Berrian attended with her daughter, Kedryn, 11, and her son, John, 10.

Berrian said the nation still has work to do in race relations and other social issues, but the Jamestown anniversary was an occasion to celebrate.

“America has come a long way, and we have a long way to go, but we need to go forward and improve the things that need improvement,” she said.

The trio were among the first in line to tour the Godspeed. John thought it was cool to celebrate 400 years of history. And he admired the Godspeed.

“I like the water. It reminds me of the Navy,” he said.

Kedryn appreciated the music and the period costumes.

“I like how they help us remember . . . how America began,” she said.

Northern Virginia resident Chris Cole lined up with her 9-year-old daughter, Kathryn, on his shoulders. He appreciated the celebration but didn’t quite agree that Jamestown marks the country’s birth.

“I’m from New England, so we tend to focus on Plymouth Rock,” said Cole, who hails from Connecticut, referring to the Pilgrims’ 1620 settlement in what is now Massachusetts.

The Godspeed made the 1607 voyage along with the Susan Constant and Discovery. The ships carried 104 men sent to use the land to make a profit for the Virginia Company of London.

The state-owned reproduction and the Landing Party Festival will stay in Alexandria through Saturday, then sail to five other Eastern seaboard cities.

Yesterday, tents and attractions spanned several city blocks along the waterfront. The Jamestown Experience enclosure held displays showing life on board a ship and in North America at the time.

It held exhibits of mattresses on which the men slept, scale models of the ships that made the trip and displays of American Indian jewelry and dwellings.

America’s Heritage Flag allowed children to paint panels that will be part of next year’s anniversary weekend. A full day of live music was planned on the Godspeed Stage. Rain and threatening storm clouds temporarily suspended play just after noon.

One of the popular draws was the on-shore motion simulator that played a video while visitors rocked and swayed as if they were on the trans-Atlantic journey. The perspective of the voyage was surprising, admitted 14-year-old Shannon McCarn of Alexandria.

“I wasn’t expecting us to see it from a rat’s point of view,” she said.

She came with sister Katie, 12, and their neighborhood friend Ariel Duney, 11.

Father Al McCarn said he brought the girls to experience once-in-a-lifetime history. Pressed about when he thought the nation’s birth date was, he reached all the way back to the Viking settlement in what is now Canada in 1000.

Still, the Jamestown commemoration is important enough to him to participate yesterday and maybe again in Tidewater.

“If we can do it, we’ll go down to Jamestown next year for the actual anniversary,” McCarn said.

Calvin R. Trice is a staff writer at the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Contact him at or (540) 574-9977.