Peoples of the Inland Sea: Native Americans and Newcomers in the Great Lakes Region, 1600–1870 By David Andrew Nichols

Abstract

In Peoples of the Inland Sea, David Andrew Nichols surveys the histories of Indigenous groups whose homelands beside the Great Lakes encompass the modern states of Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Wisconsin, Illinois, and—most relevant for this publication’s readers—Indiana. The book focuses predominantly on encounters between Native Americans and Euro Americans from the seventeenth through the mid-nineteenth century. Nichols argues that “in their dealings with Euro-American empires, the Lakes Indians often had the upper hand” (p. 3). Moreover, his accessible and engaging text convincingly asserts that continuity existed between the survival strategies American Indians employed over several centuries in their struggles against newcomers to what would become the American Midwest.