Ste. Genevieve (designated a National Historic Park in 2020) was the first permanent European settlement established on the west side of the Mississippi in Upper Louisiana, antedating St. Louis by more than a decade, and Louis Bolduc was its best-known citizen. Bolduc arrived in the Old Town of Ste. Genevieve ca. 1761, as the French and Indian War was winding down. With a focus on Bolduc and his family, readers are given a window into the workings of a rapidly evolving village during the colonial era. The depiction of Bolduc is not strictly biographical as a single historical figure but rather is set within the context of his two successive wives, his children, his neighbors, his enslaved people, and his built environment, including his famous French vertical log house. The book provides the foundation for narratives on non-British colonies, Native American interactions with colonists, and the situation of Native American and African American slavery, all within the context of Missouri before it became a state.
 

Carl J. Ekberg is Emeritus Professor of History at Illinois State University. He is the author of many books on the Pays des Illinois, including François Vallé and His World: Upper Louisiana before Lewis and Clark.

Sharon K. Person is Emerita Professor of English at St. Louis Community College. She is the author of Standing Up for Indians: Baptism Registers as an Untapped Source for Multicultural Relations in St. Louis, 1766–1821 and has coauthored two previous books with Carl Ekberg.