American History Mondays with Dr. Richard Bell: The Balance of Power in Native America

Who made America? This series of talks led by University of Maryland historian Dr. Richard Bell is designed to allow you to dip in and out depending on your interests. It examines how three peoples—Europeans, Natives, and Africans—encountered each other in North America and, through conflict and cooperation, created what became the United States. Together, these lectures provide a great primer on almost every aspect of early American history prior to 1877. But they’re designed as stand-alone offerings, so come on out for whichever topics spark your imagination.

To learn more about this series and view past and future events, click here.

This program contains some short interactive elements.

Native Americans did not disappear from colonial history in the eighteenth century. On the contrary, throughout the 1700s, Native Americans exerted a decisive influence on the American colonies encroaching all around them. But how, why, and at what cost? How did Native people navigate the rapid changes to the balance of power between themselves and the surging numbers of European settlers now living on the American continent? What did life look like in the contact zones where Europeans and Natives interacted? Who were the intermediaries, the go-betweens, who greased the wheels of diplomacy and cooperation on the borderlands between English America and Indian Country? Why did they do that work, and why did so many of those go-betweens end up dead?

Richard Bell is Professor of History at the University of Maryland and author of the new book "Stolen: Five Free Boys Kidnapped into Slavery and their Astonishing Odyssey Home" which is shortlisted for the George Washington Prize and the Harriet Tubman Prize. He has held major research fellowships at Yale, Cambridge, and the Library of Congress and is the recipient of the National Endowment of the Humanities Public Scholar award. He serves as a Trustee of the Maryland Center for History and Culture, as an elected member of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, and as a fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

This conversation is suitable for all ages

90 minutes, including a 30 minute Q&A.