Neither Empty Nor Unknown

The Montana Historical Society’s current exhibit, Neither Empty Nor Unknown, explains some of the errors Lewis and Clark made. Their primary mistake was thinking that the land was unknown and largely unpopulated, as maps of the time indicated. But in reality, communities lived, worked, and thrived on the land. Places that the expedition named in English already had names known to generations of inhabitants. How could Lewis and Clark have been so wrong? We don’t usually think of the Corps of D...