Ann Durkin Keating, Professor of History at North Central College and author of The World of Juliette Kinzie, examines the transition of this region from Potawatomi to U.S. control. 

Keating will explore key flashpoints including the Battle of Tippecanoe (1811), Fort Dearborn (1812), and the Black Hawk War (1832), tracing how a series of treaties, from the 1795 Treaty of Greenville to the 1833 Treaty of Chicago, converted Indigenous land into commodified real estate. Together, these moments reveal how legal mechanisms and military force laid the groundwork for the advance of settler colonialism in the Midwest.