A complex and troubled history defines the borders of upstate New York beyond the physical boundaries of its rivers and lakes. The United States and the state were often deceptive in their territory negotiations with the Iroquois Six Nations. Amidst the growing quest for more land among settlers and then fledgling Americans, the Indian nations attempted to maintain their autonomy. Yet state land continued to encroach the Six Nations. Local historian Cindy Amrhein takes a close and critical view of these transactions. Evidence of dubious deals, bribes, faulty surveys and coerced signatures may help explain why many of the Nations now feel they were cheated out of their territory.
Cindy Amrhein is the county historian for Wyoming County, New York. She wrote her first book, Bread & Butter: The Murders of Polly Frisch (2000), with her good friend Ellen Lea Bachorski. From 2004 to 2006 Cindy was a weekly columnist for a Native American newspaper in northern New York State, the Akwesasne Phoenix, under the pen name HistorySleuth. When she's not doing land research in the clerk's office or writing historical true crime, you can find her plotting out murder mysteries.