Rising Up from Indian Country - by Ann Durkin Keating (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

In August 1812, under threat from the Potawatomi, Captain Nathan Heald began the evacuation of ninety-four people from the isolated outpost of Fort Dearborn to Fort Wayne. The group included several dozen soldiers, as well as nine women and eighteen children. After traveling only a mile and a half, they were attacked by five hundred Potawatomi warriors. In under an hour, fifty-two members of Heald's party were killed, and the rest were taken prisoner; the Potawatomi then burned Fort Dearborn before returning to their villages.

These events are now seen as a foundational moment in Chicago's storied past. With Rising up from Indian Country, noted historian Ann Durkin Keating richly recounts the Battle of Fort Dearborn while situating it within the context of several wider histories that span the nearly four decades between the 1795 Treaty of Greenville, in which Native Americans gave up a square mile at the mouth of the Chicago River, and the 1833 Treaty of Chicago, in which the American government and the Potawatomi exchanged five million acres of land west of the Mississippi River for a tract of the same size in northeast Illinois and southeast Wisconsin. In the first book devoted entirely to this crucial period, Keating tells a story not only of military conquest but of the lives of people on all sides of the conflict. She highlights such figures as Jean Baptiste Point de Sable and John Kinzie and demonstrates that early Chicago was a place of cross-cultural reliance among the French, the Americans, and the Native Americans. Published to commemorate the bicentennial of the Battle of Fort Dearborn, this gripping account of the birth of Chicago will become required reading for anyone seeking to understand the city and its complex origins.

Review Quotes

"Keating presents an excellent addition to the interpretation of Chicago's early history while at the same time providing a reminder to all historians that early border societies were very complex."--Steven C. Eames "The Historian"

"Rising Up from Indian Country is a masterful study of Chicago's founding story. Ann Durkin Keating displays her ample skills as a historian, tackling the city's frontier experience and exploring the roles of the major players, especially those of John Kinzie and of Native Americans during this complex early period. She has cut through the fog of legend to give us a valuable look at Chicago when it was still Indian Country."
--Dominic A. Pacyga, author of Chicago: A Biography

"[An] informative, ambitious account. . . . On bookshelves in time to honor the bicentennial of the Fort Dearborn battle, Keating's well-researched book rights some misconceptions about the old conflicts, the strategies of the whites and Indians to keep their land, and how early Chicago came to exist."
-- "Publishers Weekly"

"Ann Keating has given us a new three-dimensional picture of Chicago's founding. Rising Up from Indian Country paints a compelling picture of Chicago's Indian Country origins and skillfully describes the tragedy at Fort Dearborn from the perspective of all who participated. This is a dramatic story that invites readers both to absorb new facts about the past and to reflect upon their meaning."
--Frederick E. Hoxie, author of The People: A History of Native America

"Ann Keating has taken on the least explored area of Chicago history--its raucous beginnings--and brought it magnificently to life. The book is a landmark work, deeply researched and vividly written."
--Donald L. Miller, author of City of the Century: The Epic of Chicago and the Mak

"How did Chicago stop being Indian Country and become American? Ann Durkin Keating has recast that struggle into a story far more complex than the conventional 'manifest destiny' tale. Well researched and written, this book is an eye-opening account of Chicago's earliest, most contested days."--Walter Nugent, author of Habits of Empire: A History of American Expansion

"Keating wants the people of Chicago to understand their origins more fully so that the first star on the city's flag can represent the intercultural history of Chicago more than a misunderstood battle. But this book provides something just as important for a wider audience. Rising Up from Indian Country adds depth and breadth to an understanding of the geographic, social, and political transitions that occurred on the shores of Lake Michigan in the early 1800s."--John P. Bowes "Journal of American History"

"[O]pens up a fascinating vista of lost American history. . . . It's a great story, and Ms. Keating's neutral, unemphatic prose makes it register all the more clearly."--Lee Sandlin "Wall Street Journal"

About the Author

Ann Durkin Keating is the Dr. C. Frederick Toenniges Professor of History at North Central College in Naperville, Illinois. She is coeditor of The Encyclopedia of Chicago and the author of several books, including Chicagoland: City and Suburbs in the Railroad Age and Chicago Neighborhoods and Suburbs: A Historical Guide, both published by the University of Chicago Press.