In conversation with Claire-Marie Brisson of the North American Francophone Podcast, several years ago, I introduced the concept of “back-page Americans,” which applies to many historically marginalized groups. In the context of Franco-American history, the concept grows out of the seeming invisibility of French Canadians in the mainstream (i.e. non-ethnic) American press. In reality, immigrants […]
Continue readingCategory: Borderlands
Migratory Beachheads and Marauding Canadians
We might call it a consensus. Whereas most works of Franco-American history focus on the period between the U.S. Civil War and the Great Depression, scholars would generally agree that the great hemorrhage, la grande saignée, began around 1840. Amid the economic and political turbulence that followed the Canadian Rebellions of 1837-1838, French Canadians settled […]
Continue readingThe Birthplace of Franco-America
The subscribers . . . beg leave to lay before Your Excellency their sad situation, seeing themselves abandoned in general by those who have conducted them in the just cause they have been engaged in since 1775 . . . in consequence of orders, and promises as well from Your Excellency as from the honorable […]
Continue readingA Complete 180? Webster-Ashburton in Hindsight
This year, August 9 marks the 180th anniversary of the Webster-Ashburton Treaty. In 1842, the American and British governments, respectively represented by Daniel Webster and Alexander Baring, Baron Ashburton, resolved longstanding points of contention and established grounds for better relations in North America. The first point of contention involved the still-unsettled boundary between Maine and […]
Continue readingReview: Schubart, The Lamoille Stories
Book Review Bill Schubart. The Lamoille Stories: Uncle Benoit’s Wake and Other Tales from Vermont. Hinesburg: Magic Hill Press, 2013 [2008]. Yet, the rural Franco-Vermonters have a sense of their identity as French people, both those who live on family-owned farms, and those who live in mini-mill towns like Beecher Falls. The French-Vermonter’s identity is […]
Continue readingOthering the Madawaska in Travel Narratives
Three month ago, this blog plunged into the Upper St. John Valley, an area whose history often falls on the margins of existing narratives. The hard work of reconstructing the history of the Madawaska, its relationship with neighboring regions, and its place within empires is complicated by surviving sources that tell (at best) a partial […]
Continue readingA French-Canadian Journey: Saint-Césaire to St. Albans
See Part I here. The development of Saint-Césaire, on the Yamaska River, announced the expansion of French-Canadian settlement into areas either previously unoccupied by white settlers or hegemonically English-speaking. It lay on the doorstep of the Eastern Townships, colonized successively by Loyalists, other Americans inching New England’s northern frontier onto Canadian soil, and British immigrants. […]
Continue readingReview: Mayer, Congress’s Own
Book Review Holly A. Mayer. Congress’s Own: A Canadian Regiment, the Continental Army, and American Union. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2021. It may too trite to assert, as scholars have for generations, that the American struggle for independence was complex, messy, and far from linear. But, in the wake of the national holiday, the […]
Continue readingThose Other Franco-Americans: The Madawaska Mirage?
It is not quite the mountainous wilderness—an Appalachia of the north—that I had expected. Yet, in my experience, after hours on the road, as each hill softly yields to another, you do sense that you are entering a different world. Push beyond the highways and you may see signs for Frenchville, Ouellette, and New Canada. […]
Continue readingCrossing a Closed Border in 1808, Part II
The story of the commercial embargo on Lake Champlain continues with E. A. Kendall. See Part I here. “I was in pursuit of no palace for my lodging; but, even I was destined to adventure. On the Province Point, on the north side of the boundary, I was taught to expect to find a store, […]
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