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Muddy Ground: Native Peoples, Chicago's Portage, and the Transformation of a Continent (The David J. Weber Series in the New Borderlands History) Paperback – September 12, 2023

by John William Nelson (Author)
5.0 5.0 out of 5 stars 4 ratings
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In early North America, carrying watercraft—usually canoes—and supplies across paths connecting one body of water to another was essential in the establishment of both Indigenous and European mobility in the continent's interior. The Chicago portage, a network of overland canoe routes that connected the Great Lakes and Mississippi watersheds, grew into a crossroads of interaction as Indigenous and European people vied for its control during early contact and colonization. John William Nelson charts the many peoples that traversed and sought power along Chicago's portage paths from the seventeenth to the mid-nineteenth centuries, including Indigenous Illinois traders, French explorers, Jesuit missionaries, Meskwaki warriors, British officers, Anishinaabe headmen, and American settlers. Nelson compellingly demonstrates that even deep within the interior, power relations fluctuated based on the control of waterways and local environmental knowledge.

Pushing beyond political and cultural explanations for Indigenous-European relations in the borderlands of North America, Nelson places environmental and geographic realities at the center of the history of Indigenous Chicago, offering a new explanation for how the United States gained control of the North American interior through a two-pronged subjugation of both the landscapes and peoples of the continent.
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Previous page
  1. Print length
    288 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    The University of North Carolina Press
  4. Publication date
    September 12, 2023
  5. Dimensions
    6.13 x 0.72 x 9.25 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    146967520X
  7. ISBN-13
    978-1469675206
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

Review

Muddy Ground is a brilliant synthesis of Indigenous and environmental history, illuminating the importance of Chicago as a crossroads linking the Great Lakes and the Great Plains. Nelson provides a compelling narrative showing how first Indigenous people, and subsequently the American settler state, mastered space and mobility in order to make this muddy space a gateway to the west."-Michael J. Witgen, author of Pulitzer Prize-finalist Seeing Red: Indigenous Land, American Expansion, and the Political Economy of Plunder in North America



This amazing new book reconsiders Chicago as an early American place. Framing Chicago as the continent's most important portage, Nelson recenters early American history around the swamps and wetlands of the future metropolis, exploring important currents in Indigenous history, borderlands history, environmental history, and the history of colonialism."-Robert Morrissey, author of People of the Ecotone: Environment and Indigenous Power at the Center of Early America



This book helps to shift the paradigm in how we understand the long history of Indigenous space, its conquest in the nineteenth century, and the ramifications ever since."-Kathleen DuVal, author of Independence Lost: Lives on the Edge of the American Revolution

Review

This book helps to shift the paradigm in how we understand the long history of Indigenous space, its conquest in the nineteenth century, and the ramifications ever since."—Kathleen DuVal, author of Independence Lost: Lives on the Edge of the American Revolution

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ The University of North Carolina Press (September 12, 2023)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 288 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 146967520X
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1469675206
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 15.7 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.13 x 0.72 x 9.25 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    5.0 5.0 out of 5 stars 4 ratings

About the author

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John William Nelson

John William Nelson

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John Nelson is a historian and professor, teaching at Texas Tech University. He specializes in the history of early America, with an emphasis on the borderlands of Indigenous North America and the colonial Atlantic World. His research examines the ways ecology and geography shaped the terms of cross-cultural interaction between Native peoples and European colonizers from first contact through the early republican era of the United States. Nelson earned his B.A. at Gettysburg College and his Ph.D. at the University of Notre Dame.

Nelson has published work on the American West, Indigenous America, the American Revolution, and the environmental history of the Great Lakes region. His first book, Muddy Ground: Native Peoples, Chicago's Portage, and the Transformation of a Continent, explores how a particular local landscape along Chicago's continental divide influenced colonial encounters from the seventeenth through the nineteenth centuries.

Those interested can read more about his teaching and writing—including future projects—on his website, https://www.johnwilliamnelsonhistory.com/.

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