From French Community to Missouri Town Volume 1: Ste. Genevieve in the Nineteenth Century

Ste. Genevieve, Missouri, was a small French settlement that became part of the United States in 1803. Bonnie Stepenoff's book explores what it meant to be Americanized in the country's early years, tracing the social and economic transformation of the town. She reveals previously untold stories of citizens who pursued justice and liberty under a new flag, challenging commonly held beliefs about American democracy.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 248 pages
Publication date: 15 April 2024
Publisher: University of Missouri Press

Before the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, a small French community flourished on the western bank of the Mississippi River for fifty years. However, for the residents of Ste. Genevieve, becoming Americans entailed more than just accepting a transfer of authority. Bonnie Stepenoff has written an intriguing history of Missouri's oldest permanent settlement to investigate what it meant to become Americanized in our country's early years. She picks up where other studies of Ste. Genevieve leave off, tracing the dramatic changes wrought by the transfer of sovereignty to show the process of social and economic transformation on a young nation's new frontier.

Stepenoff tells how French, Spanish, German, and American residents made necessary compromises to achieve order and community, forging a democracy that represented different approaches to such matters as education, religion, property laws, and women's rights. By examining the town's historical circumstances, legal institutions, and especially its popular customs, she shows how Ste. Genevieve differed from other towns along the Mississippi.

Stepenoff has plumbed the town's voluminous archives to share previously untold stories of Ste. Genevieve citizens that reflect how Americanization affected their lives. In these pages, we meet a free woman of color who sued a prominent white family for support of her children; a slave who obtained her own freedom and then purchased her daughters freedom; a local sheriff who joined Aaron Burr's conspiracy; and a doctor who treated cholera victims and later became a U.S. senator. More than colorful characters, these are real people shown pursuing justice and liberty under a new flag.

The story of Ste. Genevieve serves as a test.

Dimension: 229 x 152 x 23 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780826223135