The Boundaries between Us
Natives and Newcomers along the Frontiers of the Old Northwest Territory, 1750–1850
Edited by Daniel P. Barr
New essays on the settlement of the Old NorthwestAlthough much has been written about the Old Northwest territory, The Boundaries between Us fills a void in this historical literature by examining lesser known forms of interaction between Euro-Americans and native peoples and their struggles to gain control of the region and its vast resources. Comprised of eleven original essays, The Boundaries between Us presents unique perspectives on the history and significance of the contest for control of the Old Northwest territory.The essays examine the sociocultural contexts in which natives and newcomers lived, traded, negotiated, interacted, and fought, asking new questions about power, identity, and violence, both ahead of and behind the frontiers of Euro-American settlement. The essays do not attempt to present a unified interpretation but, rather, focus on both specific and general topics, revisit and reinterpret well-known events, and underscore how cultural, political, and ideological antagonisms divided the native inhabitants from the newcomers. Together, these thoughtful analyses offer a broad historical perspective on nearly a century of contact, interaction, conflict, and displacement. This volume promises to be of great importance to students and scholars of early America, the frontier, and cultural interaction.Daniel Barr is assistant professor of history at Robert Morris University. His forthcoming book is The Ends of the American Earth: War and Society on the Pittsburgh Frontier (Kent State University Press, 2007).2006, 261 pp
ISBN 0-87338-844-5
978-0-87338-844-3
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British Buckeyes
The English, Scots, and Welsh in Ohio, 1700–1900
by William E. Van Vugt
How early British immigrants shaped OhioBecause of their similar linguistic, religious, and cultural backgrounds, English, Scottish, and Welsh immigrants are often regarded as the “invisible immigrants,” assimilating into early American society easily and quickly and often losing their ethnic identities. Yet, of all of Ohio’s immigrants, the British were the most influential in terms of shaping the state’s politics and institutions. Also significant were their contributions to farming, mining, iron production, textiles, pottery, and engineering. Until British Buckeyes, historians have all but ignored and neglected these industrious settlers. Author William E. Van Vugt uses hundreds of biographies from county archives and histories, letters, Ohio and British census figures, and ship passenger lists to identify these immigrants and draw a portrait of their occupations, settlement patterns, and experiences and to underscore their role in Ohio history.William E. Van Vugt is professor of history at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He is the author of Britain to America: The Mid-Nineteenth-Century Immigrants to the United States and co-author of Race and Reconciliation in South Africa: A Multicultural Dialogue in Comparative Perspective. His articles have appeared in The Encyclopedia of the Midwest (forthcoming), The Encyclopedia of New York, Making It in America: A Biographical Sourcebook of Eminent Ethnic Americans, and The Reader’s Guide to British History.2006, 295 pp
ISBN 0-87338-843-7
978-0-87338-843-6
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Rhetorical Drag
Gender Impersonation, Captivity, and the Writing of History
by Lorrayne A. Carroll
An innovative discussion of this unique genre of American literature
In this fresh examination of seventeenth-, eighteenth-, and nineteenth-century American captivity narratives, author Lorrayne Carroll argues that male editors and composers impersonated the women presumed to be authors of these documents. This “gender impersonation” significantly shaped the authorial voice and complicated the use of these texts as examples of historical writing and as women’s literature. Carroll contends that gender impersonation was pervasive and that not enough critical attention has been paid to male intervention in female accounts.
Rhetorical Drag examines the familiar territory of captivity narratives, including versions of Hannah Duston’s captivity, and widens it by analyzing numerous examples, placing each in a deeply historicized context. For example, Mary Rowlandson’s The Soveraignty and Goodness of God is viewed as a template against which later authors might differentiate their works rather than as a model. In this vein, Carroll looks at how Cotton Mather shaped the narrative of Hannah Swarton in light of Rowlandson’s text (itself thought to have been edited by his father) and according to the ideals of female behavior outlined in his conduct book for women, Ornaments for the Daughters of Zion. A chapter on Quaker captivities illuminates the practices of censorship among Friends.
Furthermore, Carroll does original archival work on the provenance of Susannah Johnson’s narrative and makes some interesting discoveries about the practices of gender impersonation and collaborative composition that produced Johnson’s text. Using this narrative, which appeared in the late eighteenth century, Carroll discusses the shift and evolution of gender norms in the representation of women’s voices and embodied experience.
Those interested in early American literary studies and historiography as well as women’s and gender studies will find Rhetorical Drag a fascinating and important addition to the literature.
Lorrayne Carroll is associate professor of English at the University of Southern Maine.
http://upress.kent.edu/books/Carroll_L.htm
2006, 144 ppISBN 0-87338-882-8
978-0-87338-882-5
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West of the Cuyahoga
George E. CondonA narrative history of Cleveland’s West Side
“In the beginning, two settlements straddled the Cuyahoga River at its northernmost reach, where it twists its way into Lake Erie. The older and larger of the two, Cleveland, was on the east bank. The younger community on the west bank was called Brooklyn Township, later to be known as the City of Ohio or, familiarly, Ohio City, and, ultimately, the West Side. The twain faced each other as rival entities for many years, divided not only by the waters of the river but by political, historical, and economic differences as well.” —from West of the Cuyahoga Longtime columnist for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, George E. Condon turns his keen reportorial eye to Cleveland’s West Side, an area rich in history but too often overlooked in scholarly texts. In easy, polished prose, Condon regales the reader with stories of settlement, migration, and development, all the while bringing to life such characters as “Ice Wagon” Kilbane, whose legendary punch laid many West Side Irishmen low, and “Six O’Clock” Dorsey, said to have been the skinniest kid in the Old Angle neighborhood, and “Needles” McCafferty, who took his dinkey trolley sightseeing one memorable night.This seasoned newspaperman has been soaking up stray facts and vanishing information for more than five decades. Condon’s voracious appetite for facts and a nose for where to find them bring alive this Cleveland history, engaging the reader with his authentic stories, humorous anecdotes, and fond perspective.West of the Cuyahoga fills a gap in the history of Cleveland, Ohio, and reveals the gleanings of a lifetime for a local journalist and raconteur.
George E. Condon was a reporter and columnist for the Cleveland Plain Dealer for 41 years. He was honored by the Press Club of Cleveland, received the Distinguished Service Award of the Society of Professional Journalists, and was inducted in the Press Club’s Journalism Hall of Fame. He is the author of Cleveland: The Best-Kept Secret, Stars in the Water, Gaels of Laughter and Tears, and Laughter from the Rafters.
2006, 192 ppISBN 0-87338-854-2
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Caves and Culture
10,000 Years of Ohio History
Edited by Linda B. Spurlock, Olaf H. Prufer, and Thomas R. Pigott
A collection of the last forty years of research on Ohio’s caves and rockshelters
Caves and Culture seeks to address a number of important problems, specifically the use of rockshelters by humans through time and transcontinental continuities. It presents new and updated, unreported research from such Ohio caves and rockshelters as Stow Rockshelter (Stow), Peters Cave (Ross County), Hendricks Cave (Wyandotte County), and Chesser Cave (Athens), among others.Caves and Culture is primarily focused on the archaeological research of Dr. Olaf H. Prufer and his associates as they investigated and explored caves in Ohio since 1964. Spurlock and her co-editors report, sometimes reclaim, and frequently reinterpret data that will be useful to the understanding of Ohio archaeology for decades to come. Anyone with interest in local or regional (Midwestern or midcontinental) prehistory will appreciate this exploration into Ohio’s history.
Linda B. Spurlock is a biological anthropologist who specializes in forensic art and fossil reconstruction and who has also worked on many CRM archaeological projects in the northeastern United States. She is currently instructor of sciences at Stark State College in Ohio. Olaf H. Prufer is professor of anthropology at Kent State University. His other books include Archaic Transitions in Ohio and Kentucky Prehistory (Kent State University Press, 2001), Krill Cave: A Stratified Rockshelter in Summit County (Kent State University Press, 1989), and Ohio and Raven Rocks: A Specialized Late Woodland Rockshelter Occupation in Belmont County, Ohio (Kent State University Press, 1981). Thomas R. Pigott is an avocational archaeologist and the curator of the Sofsky Archives in Southington, Ohio. He created most of the images of artifacts illustrating this volume.
2006, 384 ppISBN 0-87338-865-8
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April 25, 2007