Politics, Diplomacy and Trade on the New York Frontier

Scholars examine the geopolitical, cultural, & material dynamics that shaped the 18th‑century New York frontier & the rise of Fort Niagara.

Join us for a full‑day conference exploring the complex political, diplomatic, and economic landscape of the New York frontier between the Treaty of Utrecht (1713) and the outbreak of King George’s War (1744). This pivotal era—during which the French Castle at Fort Niagara was established in 1726—reshaped relations among European empires and Haudenosaunee nations, setting the stage for larger contests to come.

Coffee and lunch will be provided for all attendees.

Five distinguished scholars will present original research and fresh perspectives on the French, British, and Haudenosaunee worlds that intersected at Niagara during the 18th century.

Featured Speakers & Presentations

Jon Parmenter

Reconsidering Fort Niagara in the Context of Haudenosaunee Territoriality, 1700–1765

Rather than viewing Niagara’s fortification as a moment of Haudenosaunee decline, this presentation reframes the site through the perspectives of the Seneca and other Haudenosaunee people. Dr. Parmenter argues that control of the Niagara Portage enabled Haudenosaunee communities to maintain agency, shape regional diplomacy, and leverage Fort Niagara for economic opportunity far longer than commonly understood.
About the Speaker: Jon Parmenter is Associate Professor of History at Cornell University and author of The Edge of the Woods: Iroquoia, 1534–1701. He teaches early North American and Indigenous history.

Maeve Kane

Shirts Powdered Red: Gender, Trade, and Diplomacy

Clothing and material culture played a critical role in communication, sovereignty, and diplomacy across Haudenosaunee–European relationships. Dr. Kane examines how gendered understandings of labor and dress shaped cross‑cultural exchanges, particularly the ways Haudenosaunee women used clothing production and trade to influence diplomatic outcomes.
About the Speaker: Maeve Kane is Associate Professor of History at the University at Albany and author of Shirts Powdered Red: Haudenosaunee Gender, Trade, and Exchange Across Three Centuries. Her work has been supported by the Mellon Foundation, NEH, the New-York Historical Society, and the New York State Archives.

Richard Weyhing

A Thing That Could Disturb the Union of Two Great Crowns: Niagara, Oswego, and the Struggle for the Great Lakes in an Age of Empire

Dr. Weyhing explores how the establishment of Niagara and Oswego in the 1720s accelerated imperial rivalries between France and Britain. These frontier posts became flashpoints in a larger geopolitical contest that would transform the interior of North America.
About the Speaker: Richard Weyhing is Associate Professor and Department Chair of History at SUNY Oswego. He specializes in Indigenous and colonial history of the Great Lakes and the Atlantic World.

Claiborne A. Skinner

Niagara and the Trade Routes of New France, 1670-1754

If one looks at a map of the Great Lakes basin, the importance of the Niagara Portage seems to jump off the page: to hold the portage was to hold the Great Lakes in thrall. Despite this apparently obvious fact, the French only built Fort Niagara quite late. By 1726, the date of its construction, they had a fort on Lake Pepin in Minnesota, and a network of forts around the Great Lakes. Until that date, however, there was no serious effort to hold Niagara. The explanation for this oversight was complex and requires looking at history, geography, economics, gravity, meteorology, and physics.

Dr. Skinner is a native of Saint Louis MO. He is the author of The Upper Country: French Enterprise in the Colonial Great Lakes. He received a BA from the University of Chicago in 1977 and an MAT and Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Chicago in between 1985 and 1990. After college, he worked as a deck hand on barges on the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers and on a sailboat on the North and South Atlantic While in graduate school, a friend and he paddled 2,500 miles along the old canoe routes of New France from Montreal to the delta of the Saskatchewan River in western Manitoba. All this served as research for his doctoral dissertation: The Sinews of Empire: The Voyageurs and the Carrying Trade of New France, 1991. He retired from teaching after 26 years at the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy in Aurora, Illinois in 2019.

Kevin Gélinas

Arms and Attire on the Frontier: The Material Culture of French Soldiers in the Upper Country, 1683–1760

This presentation highlights the regulation dress, equipment, and field adaptations of French troops stationed throughout the Upper Country, including Fort Niagara. Drawing on archaeological discoveries, surviving artifacts, and new archival findings, Gélinas illustrates how soldiers modified their clothing and arms to meet the unique demands of frontier service.
About the Speaker: Kevin Gélinas, of Trois-Rivières, Québec, is the author of The French Trade Gun in North America, 1662–1759 and Frontier Soldiers of New France (vols. 1–2). He teaches and continues extensive archival research on the material culture of New France.