The New Battle: Fort Rice vs the Environment

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Beyond the Shoreline: Heritage at Risk at Inland Sites" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

Constructed in 1864, Fort Rice become one of the first military instillations in what is now North Dakota. Fort Rice became vital to American western expansion through the fort’s expansion by the First US Volunteers, the signing of the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie establishing the Great Sioux Reservation, and the early Yellowstone expeditions to survey the Northern Pacific Railroad. Since the fort’s abandonment in 1878, it has transformed into a state historic site. While this designation implies preservation, the site is undergoing environmental transformations. The Fort is located along the banks of the Missouri River in south central North Dakota near the Standing Rock Reservation. Although erosion from the Missouri River is a major impact to the site, the paper will primarily focus on other environmental impacts including the encroaching prairie dog town and cryoturbation from the harsh North Dakota winters.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Beyond the Shoreline: Heritage at Risk at Inland Sites   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2022

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology