Jamestown, founded inwas the first successful permanent English settlement in what would become the United States. The settlement thrived for nearly years as the capital of the Virginia colony; it was abandoned after the capital moved to Williamsburg in A preservationist group took over the site in the late s, and today, it is part of a national historic park with tours, museums and ongoing archaeological digs that continue to reveal new findings. Jamestown was not the first successful permanent European settlement in what would become the United States; that distinction belongs to St. Augustine, in Florida, which was founded by the Spanish in At the beginning of the 17th century, England was lagging behind other nations when it came to colonization in the Americas. Spain controlled a vast empire in the New World that included much of South and Central America, Mexico, part of the Caribbean and a settlement in Florida. The Spanish were also moving into what is considered the American S...