What was the name of the first permanent English settlement in America?

The story behind the answer

Jamestown is correct because it was founded in 1607 by the Virginia Company as the first permanent English settlement in what is now the United States. Plymouth came later (1620) with the Pilgrims; New York began as the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam (1624) and only later became English; St. John’s in Newfoundland was used by English fishermen earlier but lacked a continuous, permanent English town in this period and is in present-day Canada.

Jamestown survived severe hardship—including the 1609–10 “Starving Time”—and endured thanks to resupply, alliances, and John Rolfe’s profitable tobacco cultivation. It also hosted the first representative assembly in English America, the House of Burgesses (1619). Memory tip: Jamestown = James I (the king who chartered it), and 1607 “jammed” the English foothold in North America.