Chronology of American Indian History

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operates its own trading houses (known as “fac-
tories”). These trading houses are to be staffed by
federal employees and are authorized to provide
Indians with non-Indian goods on credit. The
factory system is meant to end tension between
Indians and independent traders, who often
earned the enmity of their Indian trading partners
by offering shoddy goods, selling alcohol, and ne-
gotiating unfair deals.

The Land Act permits the sale of land in
the Northwest Territory.
To encourage white settlement in the Northwest
Territory (what is now Ohio, Indiana, Illinois,
Michigan, Wisconsin, and portions of Min-
nesota), Congress passes the Land Act. The act
allows Americans to buy tracts of public domain
land in the territory for a minimum of two cents
per acre. The law will quickly accelerate the dis-
placement of the Indians native to the region.

1799

The Russian American Company is chartered.
After years of lobbying by Russian trader Gregory
Shelikov (see entry for 1784), the czar grants a
royal charter that authorizes the establishment of
the Russian American Company, which will mo-
nopolize Russian fur trading in Alaska. Shelikov,
who died four years earlier, had convinced the
Russian government that by backing a fur-trading
firm it could better oversee the traders’ treatment
of native peoples and organize efforts to convert
them to the Russian Orthodox Church (see entry
for 1794).

June 15

Handsome Lake founds the
Longhouse Religion.
Living in the house of his half-brother, the Seneca
leader Cornplanter (see entry for 1789), an ailing
alcoholic named Handsome Lake becomes uncon-
scious and wakes up hours later claiming that he

has seen three visions. In the first, three messengers

offered him berries to heal him and told him that

the Creator has chosen him for a mission. In the

second, a man with nail holes in his hands shows

him the paths to Heaven and Hell. In the third, he

is given instructions from the Creator, instructions

that will become known as the Code of Handsome

Lake.

Handsome Lake’s visions provide the basis of

the Longhouse Religion, which spreads quickly

among the Seneca. By the prophet’s code, his fol-

lowers are instructed to shun alcohol, witchcraft,

gambling, sexual promiscuity, selfishness, and van-

ity. They are encouraged to value marriage and

children, seek harmonious relationships with family

members, and perform the Great Feather Dance,

the Drum Dance, and other rituals of thanksgiv-

ing. Handsome Lake also advocates the adoption of

many non-Indian ways, including white clothing,

house styles, and farming methods.

“The Creator forbids

unkindness to the Old.

We, the Four Messengers, say

this.

The Creator made it to be this

way.

An old woman shall be

as a child again

and her grandchildren

shall care for her.

For only because she is,

they are.

So they said and he said.

It was that way.”

—Handsome Lake on the

Creator’s prescribed treatment

of the elderly