Very little scholarly work has been done on the intersection of the histories of Native Americans, African Americans, and Europeans. The existing research was conducted independently by scholars with fragmented emphasis on the individual histories of each group. No scholar has ever compiled all the historical data from all sources and locations to reconstruct a comprehensive history of the historical interactions of all three groups; nor has any scholar attempted the ultimate outcome of this work, to synthesize over four hundred years of American history in one area. This will not only allow students and scholars to see the community evolve over the past 400 years, it will also give them the ability to interact with the primary sources and access maps and additional information such as locations of archival data, photographs and material culture. The principal activities of this project will include arranging and describing archival and manuscript collections; cataloging collections of printed works, photographs, maps, oral interviews, moving image, art, and material culture; and creating databases and electronic archives that correspond with and provide electronic and web-based access to the physical documents and historical artifacts. In so doing, we will attempt to compile a detailed network of collections that consolidates access to the existing primary sources that attest to over 400 years of rich history of Indian Woods, which is located in North Carolina.
This is an important project for several reasons. First, it will consolidate the fragmentary history of these three groups in eastern North Carolina and how they interacted with one another for the first time. This will give a clearer understanding of what happened to Native Americans in the Northeastern and Southeastern Woodlands. Second, the project will also introduce new digital technology, which will allow students of all levels (K-12, undergraduate students, graduate students, and scholars) and community members to examine and interact with this history. Finally, this project will be an inter-institutional and interdisciplinary endeavor involving scholars and students from the history departments as well as the special collections departments of each of the institutional libraries at Duke University, East Carolina University, North Carolina Central University, North Carolina Division of Archives and History, Raleigh, North Carolina, The Historic Hope House, The University of Memphis, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. As materials are identified and cataloged, Native sites such as villages, burial grounds, trading posts, ceremonial grounds and battle sites will be matched with documentary evidence that speak to their historical development and significance. As we explore and understand more about Indian Woods and the creolization that occurred there between European, African, and Indian cultures, we will begin to understand more about what it means to be American, Native American and African American.
This work will serve as a model for how local histories can be reconstructed, preserved and made available to the public and should offer new historical insights as well as avenues and resources for further research into the relationships between Indians, Blacks, and Whites and how those relationships continue to impact America today.