Groundless: Rumors, Legends, and Hoaxes on the Early American Frontier. Early America: History, Context, Culture Series. By Gregory Evans Dowd.

Abstract

Groundless: Rumors, Legends, and Hoaxes on the Early American Frontier. Early America: History, Context, Culture Series. By Gregory Evans Dowd. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2015. xi + 391 pp. Illustrations, notes, bibliographical essay, index. $34.95.) Gregory Evans Dowd masterfully “seizes upon the uncertainties in [historical] evidence to attempt a new history of the early North American colonial encounter” (p. 275). By situating rumor and legend at the center of his analysis, Dowd reveals that rumoring and hoaxes—from the beginnings of European colonization to Andrew Jackson’s campaign for Indian removal—bore great power on the frontiers of early America. In fact, rumors and legends ultimately acted as forces of violence and colonialism. In addition, Dowd uses the stories that were told about those rumors to … bryan.rindfleisch{at}marquette.edu