The Digital Precontact Experience

Explore thousands of years of Ohio precontact history with the touch of a button.

Introduction

Welcome to the Digital Precontact Experience! This on-line StoryMap highlights the Fort Recovery Historical Society’s precontact artifact collection, housed in the Fort Recovery State Museum.

Journey through nearly 14,000 years, from the earliest known presence of humans in North America until the advent of European colonization in the 15th century. The Digital Precontact Experience tells the story of Ohio’s first people through the lens of archaeology.

Archaeologists organize the past into cultural time periods, defined by recognizable artifacts, activities, and ways of life. In North America, the first cultural time period is the Paleoindian Period, when people started migrating into North America. This digital exhibit takes you from the Paleoindian Period, through the subsequent Archaic Period and Woodland Period, and to the Late Precontact Period, when Europeans began colonizing North America.

Using the StoryMap

The menu headings will help you navigate through time. Each link contains a descriptive summary, maps, videos, artifact images, and 3D artifact models for that cultural time period. Scroll down or click on a menu heading to continue with the Digital Precontact Experience!

Glossary

Paleoindian Period

Archaic Period

Woodland Period

Late Precontact Period

Historic Tribes

Initial American Indian contact with Europeans in the 17th and 18th centuries was based on the fur trade. For a century, the Indigenous people traded with the French and British in a manner beneficial to all. By 1750, the Miami, Delaware, Shawnee, Wyandot, Ottawa, and Potawatomi tribes hunted and lived in what is now Ohio and Indiana. To learn more, see Historic Period in Virtual First Ohioans.

Euro-Americans’ cultural understanding of land ownership saw untamed wilderness as unused and wasted potential. This view justified invasion and removal in the name of “civilization”. The British, French, and the United States used various means of acquiring land, alternating between aggression and treaties, using economic forces to divide different tribes, and used maps to name and claim territory. The Treaty of Paris (1783) changed the dynamic of land tensions when Britain ceded “control” of native lands to the United States. The government planned to use this newly acquired land to generate revenue to settle debts, further justifying incursions into native lands, and leading to uncontrolled occupation of American Indian homelands by Euro-American settlers.

St. Clair’s Defeat in 1791 and the Battle of Fort Recovery in 1794 between American forces and an American Indian alliance are two significant Northwest Indian War battles which occurred at the site of the present-day village of Fort Recovery, Ohio. The two battles represent the largest engagements of the American Army and American Indian forces in the history of the United States. They were important in defining the course of the infant American nation and continued to contribute to the precipitous loss of significant territory and independence for the American Indian tribes of the Northwest Territory.

The first battle, known variously as St. Clair’s Defeat, Little Turtle’s Victory, or the Battle of the Wabash, occurred on November 4, 1791. The American Army consisting of approximately 1,400 soldiers was swiftly devastated by a American Indian alliance of approximately 1,500 warriors from nine different tribes (Miami, Shawnee, Delaware, Ottawa, Wyandotte, Potawatomi, Chippewa, Seneca, Cherokee). Sources vary on the exact number, but it is estimated that around 800 American officers, soldiers and civilians were killed and another 350 were wounded. The exact casualty numbers for the American Indian alliance are unknown. It is estimated that their causalties were around a tenth of the American's, with some estimates as low as 30 warriors killed. The devastating loss to the United States Army was attributed to the skilled tactics of Mishikinakwa (Little Turtle) of the Miami and Weyapiersenwah (Blue Jacket) of the Shawnee coupled with missteps by the U.S. forces including a corrupt Army Quartermaster providing subpar supplies, poorly trained American soldiers, and unpreparedness on Major General Arthur St. Clair’s part.

The American Indian victory at St. Clair's Defeat ultimately only delayed Euro-American settlement in the Northwest Territory. In 1793, Major General Anthony Wayne built a fort at the site of the defeat and it was named Fort Recovery. Between June 30 and July 1, 1794, a confederation of over 2,000 American Indians from 12 different tribes with British support attacked the fort. Mishikinakwa (Little Turtle) again led the American Indian alliance. This time the American forces held, and the American Indians retreated. The second battle marked the defeat of the largest American Indian force ever assembled. The victory at Fort Recovery and subsequently at the Battle of Fallen Timbers on August 20, 1794, marked the end of the period of conflict known as the Northwest Indian War.

Learn more about the these battles:

New Discoveries at Fort Recovery, Ohio History Connection (2011)

Tribes Today

Listed below are the federally recognized tribes whose tribal ancestors defended their homelands in St. Clair’s Defeat in 1791 and the Battle of Fort Recovery in 1794. The location of their tribal headquarters is shown on the map. Each tribe is linked to their own website, where more information on both their history and today’s tribal citizens can be found.