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Native American History

Fess Parker (left) played Davy Crockett (right) in a popular 1950s Disney TV show.

How Davy Crockett, the Rugged Frontiersman Killed at the Alamo, Became an Unlikely American Hero

During his lifetime, Crockett—who went by David, not Davy—shaped his own myth. In the 20th century, his legacy got a boost from none other than Walt Disney

On June 10, state and tribal officials recovered the vessel from the water.

Cool Finds

This Dugout Canoe Made From a 12-Foot-Long Log Was Found Bobbing in a North Carolina River

The newly discovered vessel is one of 79 known dugout canoes that have been unearthed throughout the state

Ancestral Menominee farmers grew corn, beans and squash in earthen mounds they built on Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

New Research

Massive Fields Where Native American Farmers Grew Corn, Beans and Squash 1,000 Years Ago Discovered in Michigan

The ancestors of the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin built earthen mounds to grow crops. The site could be the largest preserved archaeological field system in the eastern United States

Visitors pose atop Arch Rock, a geological formation on Mackinac Island.

How America’s Forgotten Second National Park Lost Its Federal Status—and Gained a New Lease on Life as a State Park

Much of Mackinac Island was designated as a national park in 1875, but it proved to be too expensive for the government to maintain, so it was transferred to the State of Michigan in 1895

Sarah Grandmother’s Knife, Apsáalooke (Crow), age 10, wearing an elk-tooth dress and sticking out her tongue playfully in Montana, 1910

See the Stunning Archival Photographs That Tell the Stories of Everyday Native Life and Communities

The Archive Center at the National Museum of the American Indian presents a new exhibition that can help “interrupt the romanticized, stereotypical images often shared of Native peoples throughout history”

Whatever happend to President Franklin D. Roosevelt's tradition of fireside chats?

What Happened to FDR’s Fireside Chats? And More Questions From Our Readers

You’ve got questions. We’ve got experts

The Newark Earthworks in Ohio consist of three sections of preserved earthworks: the Great Circle Earthworks, the Octagon Earthworks and the Wright Earthworks.

An Ohio Earthwork Where Thousands Once Gathered for Celestial Observations and Religious Ceremonies Is Open to the Public

An earthen enclosure called the Octagon is drawing much-deserved attention to the state’s history-filled mounds built some 2,000 years ago by the Hopewell culture

Sophie Mousseau is identified simply as “Arapaho” on one version of the photo and “Dakota” on another.

When a Historian Saw This Haunting Photograph of a Nameless Native Girl, She Decided She Had to Identify Her

In 1868, Sophie Mousseau was photographed at Fort Laramie alongside six white Army officers. But her identity—and her life story—remained unknown for more than a century

Illustration by Meilan Solly / Photos via the Maryland Department of Transportation

These Everyday Artifacts Tell the Story of Harriet Tubman’s Father’s Home as Climate Change Threatens the Historic Site

The Maryland Department of Transportation launched an interactive virtual museum, showcasing finds from where Ben Ross lived after emancipation

Lily Gladstone poses on the red carpet at the Academy Awards in March 2024.

See Lily Gladstone’s Stunning Oscar Gowns Designed by an Indigenous Artist

The two gowns were a collaboration between Gucci and a porcupine quillwork artist. Both are now on display at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian

Photographer Wayne Martin Belger created these striking platinum palladium prints by exposing the negative onto a paper coated with platinum and palladium salts, producing a special sharpness and subtlety. Belger built this vintage-style view camera specifically for this story, crafting the body from local Arizona mesquite and juniper and installing a late-19th-century French landscape lens in front, to give the prints a timeless feel. Belger calls it his “Tséyi” camera.  

How Canyon de Chelly Brought a Photographer Back to Life

Wayne Martin Belger set out to make indelible photos of a mystical site on the Navajo Nation. First he needed to relearn how to walk

A view of Tse Yaa Kin’s central tower complex, constructed around the end of the 13th century A.D.

For Centuries, Indigenous People Lived in These Desert Canyons. Now, New Technology Reveals Extraordinary Details About This Sacred Site

In the Arizona desert, researchers are learning so much more about the peoples who have inhabited this land since antiquity

Arctic grayling live in many northern waterways, but they disappeared from Michigan in 1936.

These Shimmery Fish Disappeared From Michigan Nearly a Century Ago. Can They Make a Comeback?

Great Lakes tribes and state biologists are working together to reintroduce Arctic grayling to northern Michigan’s waterways

The cache pit was discoverd on a hill overlooking the Knik Arm, a thin brach of the Gulf of Alaska.

Cool Finds

Archaeologists Unearth Rare 1,000-Year-Old Food Storage Pit in Alaska

Initial findings suggest the cache was used to preserve moose and caribou meat in the harsh climate of southeastern Alaska

The new Chuckwalla National Monument protects more than 624,000 acres in southern California.

Biden Establishes Two New National Monuments in California

The Chuckwalla National Monument and the Sáttítla Highlands National Monument will protect more than 848,000 acres of public lands

From these upper hip bones, researchers extracted an ancient genome of the bacteria that causes syphilis.

Ancient DNA Offers Crucial Hints to the Origin of Syphilis, a Decades-Long Mystery That Has Divided Scientists

Researchers found evidence that early versions of syphilis-causing bacteria existed in the Americas long before the arrival of Columbus

Dating from 1940, this photograph depicts a sign at the site of the Wounded Knee Massacre, South Dakota, where 250 American Indians were killed in 1890.

On This Day in History

On This Day in 1890, the U.S. Army Killed Nearly 300 Lakota People in the Wounded Knee Massacre

The mass murder made sensational news at the time, but getting to the heart of the matter took a much deeper view of American history

Maritime archaeologist Tamara Thomsen discovered this 1,200-year-old dugout canoe in Lake Mendota, Wisconsin, in June 2021.

Archaeologists Are Finding Dugout Canoes in the American Midwest as Old as the Great Pyramids of Egypt

In the waterways connected to the Great Lakes, researchers uncover boats that tell the story of millennia of Indigenous history

A circa 1883 photograph of Lakota leader Sitting Bull

On This Day in History

Why Sitting Bull Was Killed by Indian Agency Police at His Cabin on the Standing Rock Reservation

Because of his alleged involvement with the Ghost Dance movement, the Lakota leader, who died on this day in 1890, was seen as a threat to the U.S. government’s efforts to subdue Indigenous Americans

John J. Egan's massive 24-panel Panorama of the Monumental Grandeur of the French Colonial Mississippi Valley depicts the Natchez revolt. Created in 1850, the panorama features scenes from across the Mississippi and Ohio River valleys.

On This Day in History

In a ‘Horrific’ Attack Meant to Scare the Intruders, Natchez Warriors Revolted Against the French, Killing 230 Colonists

The 1729 attack in present-day Mississippi was part of a vicious cycle of violence and retribution

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