Native American Lead Mining on the Volatile Frontier of the Expanding American Empire.

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Considering Frontiers Beyond the Romantic: Spaces of Encroachment, Innovation, and Far Reaching Entanglements" , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

During the early 19th Century Native American people in the Driftless Region were participating in the industrial level mining of lead to fuel global markets. This success drew the attention of the growing American polity and led to the familiar process of intrusion, volatility and ultimately dispossession through violence, land cessions and forced removals. Although this dismal pattern is well understood, previous work has examined these processes through the fur trade and arrival of settlers. In this example, Native American people were controlling a large scale and profitable industry. This factor led to differences in the type of American intruders, government responses and Native American strategies to defend their people, territories and livelihood. Through understanding of this unique situation we gain a more nuanced view for the complexities of the frontier situation and respect for the ways Native American people protected their culture through unimaginable stress and challenges.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Considering Frontiers Beyond the Romantic: Spaces of Encroachment, Innovation, and Far Reaching Entanglements   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2020

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 956