Detroit's industrial health has long been crucial to the American economy. Today's troubles not withstanding, Detroit has experienced multiple periods of prosperity, particularly in the second half of the eighteenth century, when the city was the center of the thriving fur trade. Its proximity to the West as well as its access to the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River positioned this new metropolis at the intersection of the fur-rich frontier and the Atlantic trade routes. In Frontier Seaport, Catherine Cangany details this seldom-discussed chapter of Detroit's history. She argues that by the time of the American Revolution, Detroit functioned much like a coastal town as a result of the prosperous fur trade, serving as a critical link in a commercial chain that stretched all the way to Russia and China - thus opening Detroit's shores for eastern merchants and other transplants. This influx of newcomers brought its own transatlantic networks and fed residents' desires for popular culture and manufactured merchandise. Detroit began to be both a frontier town and seaport city: a mixed identity, Cangany argues, that prevented it from becoming a thoroughly "American" metropolis.

About the Author
Catherine Cangany is assistant professor of history at the University of Notre Dame.

Reviews
"In this thoroughly researched and well-written study, Cangany shows how the people of late eighteenth-century Detroit participated fully in a vibrant Atlantic economy. Detroit's entrepreneurs-Native Americans as well as Europeans-developed exciting new trade goods such as moccasins that sustained a sophisticated level of commerce. Frontier Seaport is an impressive and challenging accomplishment." (T. H. Breen, author of Marketplace of Revolution)"



Book Information
ISBN 9780226096704
Author Catherine Cangany
Format Hardback
Page Count 288
Imprint University of Chicago Press
Publisher The University of Chicago Press
Weight(grams) 510g
Dimensions(mm) 24mm * 17mm * 2mm