The huge 400th anniversary party this weekend commemorating the founding of Great Britain’s first permanent settlement in North America would have happened elsewhere if a group of would-be colonists had not been captured as they sailed through the Caribbean on their way to the New World.

The three-day celebration finished Sunday with a program that included a speech from President Bush and traced the United States’ roots to Jamestown, the little colony on the banks of the James River near Williamsburg.