ABSTRACT
The annual Feast of the Hunters' Moon, hosted by the Tippecanoe County Historical Association at Fort Ouiatenon, Indiana, is celebrated as a re-enactment of the historical confluence between the French traders and the local Wea people in the eighteenth century. The two-day exposition of traditional trades, historical regalia, and costumes, and the arrival of re-enactors by canoe to the Wabash-adjacent site draws tens of thousands of visitors each year. The exchanges between the original inhabitants of Indiana and the encroaching entrepreneurial explorers were deeply entrenched in the negotiation of land ownership and racial relations that are overwritten by the narrative presented through the Feast of the Hunters' Moon. In striving to recreate an authentic experience of local past meticulously focused on the naturalization of white settlers to the Indiana territory, the Tippecanoe County Historical Association has simultaneously undermined the historic presence of the Indigenous who called the land home. As such, the modern revival of the Feast of the Hunters' Moon as a major tourist event is the product of ongoing colonization in the Midwest, obfuscating the racial prejudices and cultural genocide that undergird the very creation of the state.
