"As part of the Treaty of Paris, in which Great Britain recognized the new United States of America, Britain ceded the land that comprised the immense Northwest Territory, a wilderness empire northwest of the Ohio River containing the future states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin. A Massachusetts minister named Manasseh Cutler was instrumental in opening this vast territory to veterans of the Revolutionary War and their families for settlement. Included in the Northwest Ordinance were three remarkable conditions: freedom of religion, free universal education, and most importantly, the prohibition of slavery. In 1788 the first band of pioneers set out from New England for the Northwest Territory under the leadership of Revolutionary War veteran General Rufus Putnam. They settled in what is now Marietta on the banks of the Ohio River. McCullough tells the story through five major characters: Cutler and Putnam; Cutler's son Ephraim; and two other men, one a carpenter turned architect, and the other a physician who became a prominent figure in American science. They and their families created a town in a primeval wilderness, while coping with such frontier realities as trees of a size never imagined, floods, fires, wolves, bears, even an earthquake, all the while negotiating a contentious and sometimes hostile relationship with the native people. Like so many of McCullough's subjects, they let no obstacle deter or defeat them. Drawn in great part from a rare and all-but-unknown collection of diaries and letters by the key figures, The Pioneers is a uniquely American story of people whose ambition and courage led them to remarkable accomplishments."--Dust jacket.

In the year 1787, George Washington was President of the newly formed Government of the United States of America. The Capitol was located in New York City. The vast area west of the Appalachian Mountains to the Mississippi River was acquired from Great Britain by the Treaty of Paris in 1783. This area was bordered on the north by Canada and on the south by the Ohio River and encompassed the present day states of Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois and Wisconsin. The Government of Great Britain had claimed this territory and by the signing of numerous treaties the Indians living there had given up most of their rights to this land. The British forbid white settlement there to appease the Indians. At the end of the American Revolution, the United States now claimed this territory by “Right of Conquest” over Great Britain and with the creation of the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 opened it up for white settlement against the protests of the Indians who still considered it their land. The first permanent American settlement northwest of the Ohio River was Marietta in the year 1788 and soon after more and more pioneers flooded into the country. It was not an easy life for these early pioneers. They had to deal with hostile Indians, disease, starvation and the lack of basic necessities, but they made it and the State of Ohio was admitted into the union in 1803. This book chronicles the events from the earliest explorations of the territory, the purchase of lands by The Ohio Company, the early settlements and the trying times of the early pioneers who settled and tamed this original Northwest Territory.

Based upon the famous Draper Collection at the Wisconsin Historical Society, this transcription of original sources was conceived as a sequel to the Society's volume on Lord Dunmore's War of 1774. The documents selected by Thwaites and Kellogg pick up the story in March 1775 and continue through May 1777, essentially the first two years of the American Revolution. The sources shed light on the principal incidents and personalities of importance along the broad frontier that extended from the Greenbrier region of Virginia to Kittanning on the Upper Allegheny. The volume closes with the transfer of the command of Fort Pitt to General Hand signifying a milestone in American military history and in the history of westward expansion.

Learn what school was like in pioneer times.

Eager young readers can now discover and experience Laura Ingalls Wilder's books like never before. Author Annette Whipple encourages children to engage in pioneer activities while thinking deeper about the Ingalls and Wilder families as portrayed in the nine Little House books. The Laura Ingalls Wilder Companion provides brief introductions to each Little House book, chapter-by-chapter story guides, and "Fact or Fiction" sidebars, plus 75 activities, crafts, and recipes that encourage kids to "Live Like Laura" using easy-to-find supplies. Thoughtful questions help the reader develop appreciation and understanding of Wilder's stories. Every aspiring adventurer will enjoy this walk alongside Laura from the big woods to the golden years.