In this highly readable and remarkable book, Michael S. Nassaney and contributing authors synthesize findings from two decades of archaeological investigations at Fort St. Joseph—a large eighteenth-century multiethnic community of Native Americans, French, French Canadians, and English located in present-day Niles, Michigan. Built initially as a French mission settlement, the site became a French military stronghold and a hub for the international fur trade. Authors of chapters in Fort St. Joseph Revealed use historical archaeology to examine the operation of the fur trade and to investigate processes of ethnogenesis that took place—namely, how community and identity were created through the adoption and retention of various beliefs and practices.

The bulk of the volume draws out the story of Fort St. Joseph through considerations of various aspects of material culture and materiality: archival sources; faunal material to explore economy and diet; architecture, landscape, and nearby sites to better understand how space was constructed in and near the fort in relation local economies and social engagements; and beads, lead seals, and tinkling cones to discuss how people fashioned their bodies and identities. Details in these chapters not only provide us with ways to situate lived experience at Fort St. Joseph within broader patterns of eighteenth-century colonial history and the global fur trade but also articulate the particular local experiences of settler colonialism that occurred in this part of the Great Lakes region. Identities were created, manipulated, and contested within the intersections of local political, social, economic, and sexual engagements, collectively shaping a diverse and unique multiethnic community. Each chapter articulates material dimensions of these engagements, drawing out particular aspects of ethnogenesis in assemblages and data while also comparing interpretations of these data with those from other French colonial settlements in North America.

The greatest strength of this book, however, is how community is articulated as the heart of the story of Fort St. Joseph. The book outlines numerous ways to consider community building as it occurred in the past and as it is occurring at present. Processes of ethnogenesis created a multiethnic community in the past; the present-day community of archaeologists, students, and local and heritage stakeholders has formed through investigations in the recent past and present of a colonial history. Each chapter refers to the model of public archaeology that is discussed in more detail in Chapter 9, “Public Archaeology at Fort St. Joseph,” in which Erica A. D'Elia, Kelley Berliner, Sue Reichert, and Nassaney outline their goals of outreach and engagement to local community and heritage stakeholders. Today, collaboration is the aim of most archaeological investigations to address colonial violence and injustices, to provide multiple narratives about the past in the present, and to codevelop research questions and practice. I appreciate their discussion here and in Nassaney's final chapter, “Fort St. Joseph Revealed Then and Now,” which is about the challenges and benefits of working with multiple communities to develop and share knowledge about local history and contemporary Indigenous perspectives. An impressive array of programs has been developed for nonprofessional audiences so as to increase public awareness of the site and its significance as well as encourage participation and partnership in the project of “revealing Fort St. Joseph” through volunteer activities, K–12 outreach, and other educational initiatives. Social media and open houses have provided spaces for engagement and feedback, and an advisory committee—including representatives from the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi, based in Dowagiac, Michigan—has helped to further refine annual project goals.

Fort St. Joseph Revealed concludes with an overview by Nassaney about the larger history of the site, including its “discovery” by nineteenth-century Anglo settlers and their particular understanding of local history, how it came to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places in the late twentieth century, and the last 20 years of work at the site. As Nassaney notes, it is “a case study in how a community has forgotten, remembered, and celebrated its past” (p. 223). The details of the complex colonial history of Fort St. Joseph are nuanced and, as Nassaney and contributing authors to the book demonstrate, a collaborative archaeology approach is the best tool for investigating this deeply textured history. I highly recommend Fort St. Joseph Revealed not only for its detailed material and archival analysis of a historic site but as a manual for how to do public archaeology and build community in contemporary practice.