The fact remains that this is a battleground.

you know, this is a place where people did lose their lives.

History is always much more complicated than people might initially imagine.

So it is a little confusing, the name French and Indian War.

You know, at face value, it looks like the French are fighting the Indians, when that's the complete opposite.

It's the French and all their Indian allies against the British.

The French and Indian War was the American Theater of the Seven Years War that was going on in Europe between England and France.

They were always fighting against each other.

Most indigenous nation end up fighting with the French because the French, unlike the British, integrated themselves into native lifestyles.

They married into tribes, some even learned language.

The end of the French and Indian War, which ends about 1763, the British come out the winners in this.

And they come in and they take a different approac to the indigenous people here.

The British don't look a the indigenous people as people.

They see them as savages or heathens so they have some pretty harsh ways of dealing with Indigenous folks.

One of the harshes is moving them off their land.

On June 2nd, 1763, is when a group of Odawa, Sauk and Ojibwe warriors took this well manned fort.

And they were part of a larger coalition of Anishinaabe and other native nations taking forts all through the Great Lakes.

Michilimackinac was a French community.

It sat astride a giant crossroads.

So Michilimackinac, has always bee an important strategic location perhaps most importantly, an economic outpos for the Great Lakes fur trade.

And it's a very pivotal part of our history but also North American history and the eventual creation of the United States.

So Pontiac is an Odawa leader and he sees what's happening.

He sees that, okay, this French and Indian war has ended.

This land is now going to go to the British.

Pontiac's main thought is how do I protect my people and how do I protect my land?

Pontiac sees the writing on the wall.

But how do you get into the fort?

So Pontiac devised a plan.

The local Ojibwa wanted the British gone.

They wanted the British garriso out of Michilimackinac.

This one was one of the larger forts.

High walls, lots of soldiers.

So they just couldn't take it by force.

They had to use a ruse or a trick And what they did was pick the day, it was strategic.

It was the king's birthday.

So they said, well, we want to honor the king with the lacrosse game.

And lacrosse, hundreds of years ago was a very violent game.

It's often called the little brother of war, because sometimes people died when they played lacrosse.

So the game is going on.

It's getting heated.

There's a group of Anishinaabe women who are watchin and they're like, right against the backs, against the fort and they all have blankets on.

They had weapons under the blankets, spears, clubs, knives.

And as the warrior throw the ball through the door, the British crack the door a little bit wider so they can let the warrior go and get the ball.

The warriors run by the women and the women hand off all the weapons.

And so they're armed instantly.

I mean, it completely overwhelmed the British and it was instantaneously hand-to-han combat.

And they have the fort.

They seized it.

And it puts the British on notice that we just can't come in and push these peopl around like we thought we could.

You know, they fight back and they fight well.

So they establish this peace after Pontiac's war.

And out of this, there's the proclamation line that is establishe at the Appalachian Mountains and the British say west of this is native territory.

You go on to that territory, they're going to fight.

And it's this recognition that we have a relationship, of some sort, with all these native nations So the Proclamation Line for me as a native person is pretty, pretty significant.

So the legacy of Pontiac's Rebellion at this fort is is, is huge.