The Founders of America: How Indians Discovered the Land, Pioneered in It, and Created Great Classical Civilizations; How They Were Plunged into A D

By Francis Jennings

Book Overview

This book traces the history of the American Indians from their early mastery of the wilderness, through the classical era of their great civilizations, and the dark ages that followed European invasion and conquest. Jennings investigates how the Indians struggled to retain their cultural identity against efforts of government and society to force assimilation onto them. He documents the gradual population and cultural revival among Indians in the 20th century after their catastrophic decline in earlier years.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0393033732
• ISBN13: 9780393033731
• Release Date: January 1993
• Publisher: W W Norton & Co Inc
• Length: 458 Pages
• Weight: 1.82 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.5" x 1.4" x 6.3"

Customer Reviews

Solid History of Native Americans

The myth persists that natives were savages and uncivilized. Little is told in schools how they were conquered and eradicated. They lived here for 30 millennia only to be effectively wiped out. No, they weren't perfect, and not all settlers and explorers were tyrants, but Jennings' book sets history straight. Part of the myth arose from what early settlers found: The natives had been devastated by disease. Their existence destroyed and a shadow of what it once was. This gave rise to myths that these savages couldn't have built cities, Cahokia and the like, and were never much more than cavemen. People like the Mormons built their religion on these myths. History usually rectifies myths, if not slowly, and Jennings is a must read for those interested in American history, espeically pre-U.S. (though he follows the native story to the early 1990s). Perhaps he focuses too much on the negatives, but normally this history is completely ignored. We need to learn form the past and not forget who this continent once belonged to. We didn't discover it, they did. See also 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus, Mound Builders and A Voyage Long and Strange: On the Trail of Vikings, Conquistadors, Lost Colonists, and Other Adventurers in Early America.