Thursday, October 25, 6:00 to 8 PM at VSARA, 1078 US RTE 2, Middlesex

Murder and Indigenous Mobility in Nineteenth-Century Vermont

Vermont is the traditional homeland of the Abenaki people, and current conversations about indigenous Vermont focus on Abenaki persistence on the land. This presentation by cultural historian Jill Mudgett tells another story about indigeneity in Vermont by focusing on a man from southern New England who arrived in Vermont during the late nineteenth century and was then murdered in the Vermont woods. Surviving archival documents of the murder and subsequent trial not only tell us what white Vermonters thought about indigeneity, but reveal much about Native agency, mobility, and presence on the land. Even today the murder scene remains as remote as it was a century and a half ago. In considering natural environments like those woods, environmental histories help us to honor life stories otherwise untold, populating our pasts with voices and characters who remain outside the archive walls. The environmental history of indigenous movement through spaces both marginal and central to settler communities enriches current conversations about New England homelands and hints at historical connections between Northeastern tribes.

Jan 23, 2025, 3 to 6 PM

Jan 25, 2025, 10 AM

Jan 25, 2025, 3 to 4:15 PM