The Rise and Fall of North American Indians: From Prehistory through Geronimo

by William Brandon

Who were the first settlers in North America? Where did they come from? How did they survive? In this expansive one-volume account of the native peoples of North America, eminent historian William Brandon―who devoted much of his life to examining this subject―presents this revelatory history of the development and culture of the native peoples of North America, from their incipience through the late nineteenth century. From the Valley of Mexico to the Bering Straight, a multitude of diverse cultures settled and created art, healing medicines, and an agriculture that brought us maize, potatoes, chilies, avocado, and tobacco. Among those from central America were the art-obsessed Mayans and Olmecs; from North America came the Ojibwa, Powhatan, Cree, Illinois, Apache, Cherokee, Natchez, Sioux, and many others. In The Rise and Fall of North America's Indians, Brandon brings this world to life and chronicles 10,000 years of Indian history.

Genres: History, Nonfiction

618 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 2003

About the author

William Brandon was an American writer and historian.

During his long career Brandon published a variety of short fiction, essays, and poetry, which appeared in magazines such as Esquire, The Atlantic Monthly, The Paris Review, The Saturday Evening Post, and Reader's Digest. However, he is best known for his historical work documenting Native Americans and the American West. Although Brandon's formal education ended after high school, his scholarship was sufficiently respected that he was from 1966–1967 a visiting professor at the University of Massachusetts, and later conducted a seminar series on Native American literature at California State College in Long Beach, California.

Brandon died in Clearlake, California, on 11 April 2002, of cancer.



-Wikipedia

Reviews

[Ben Morgan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Uplifting book - favourite quote:

People (if there are any) a thousand years from now may well see our 20th century as a tremendous explosion of titanic wars, violent revolutions, demonic famines, and demoniac massacres, all attending the opening of eternity's smash hit, nuclear weaponry

[Mel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Chatty and magisterial, this sweeping work on North American First Nations peoples ("from prehistory through Geronimo") is the last published work finished by historian William Brandon before his death in 2002. It reads like the work of a scholar who knows this is his last publication and wants to place on final display the breadth of his knowledge and his unequivocal yet world-weary objections to centuries of injustice and genocide. It reads like the work of someone who knows that historical memory matters--that forgetting is erasure--and who wants to revel in memory, in print. There are occasions when his whimsy slides into romanticism, footnotes notwithstanding, but his overall genuine respect for and vast knowledge about the numerous and diverse First Nations peoples are still the most notable features of this book.

Notable: Author William Brandon's formal education ended with high school.

This was a fitting accompaniment to some recent reading I'd done about the American Indian Movement (AIM).

Finally, this quote is pretty awesome, and there are others just as funny: "With the conquest of Mexico and Peru the carcass of the hemisphere had lost its liver and lights" (p. 116). William Brandon gets points for being both erudite and hilarious.

[Laura Vogt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Extremely well-written. I was looking for specific information, so did not read cover-to-cover, but found myself sinking into the story of the text. Recommended.

[Hillary Wheeler · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very very dense. Throughly researched. Much more to the Native American history than I knew and even more not discussed in this text.

[Chris Leuchtenburg · Rating 2 out of 5]

I put this aside after reading 100+ pages. I have been looking for a balanced, comprehensive Native American history, but this is not it. It is filled with fascinating detail and intriguing stories filled out by the enthusiastic imagination of a dedicated amateur. But it takes too many liberties with the limited facts of the pre-history cultures, and dives too deeply into minor topics.