Download Indians and Emigrants: Encounters on the Overland Trails AudioBook Free
Within the first book to give attention to relationships between Indians and emigrants on the Overland Trails, Michael L. Tate shows that such encounters were a lot more often seen as a co-operation than by discord. Having combed hundreds of unpublished resources and Indian dental traditions, Tate finds Indians and Anglo-Americans consistently trading goods and news with one another, and Indians providing various types of assistance to overlanders. Tate admits that both factors normally used their own needs and ethical criteria, which sometimes created distrust. But many works of kindness by emigrants and by Indians can be attributed to simple individuals compassion. Not until the mid-1850s do Plains tribes commence to see their freedom and cultural traditions threatened by the flood of white travelers. As buffalo herds dwindled and more Indians passed on from diseases helped bring by emigrants, violent clashes between wagon trains and Indians became more regular, and the first Anglo-Indian wars erupted on the plains. Yet, even in the 1860s, Tate finds, friendly encounters were still the guideline. Despite thousands of mutually beneficial exchanges between whites and Indians between 1840 and 1870, the image of Plains Indians as the overland pioneers' most detrimental opponents prevailed in American popular culture. In detailing the persistence of that stereotype, Tate looks for to dispel one of the West's oldest cultural misunderstandings.
