Product Description

In the mid-1970s, the Mashantucket Pequot tribe had only one member -- an elderly woman who pleaded with her grandson to come live on the impoverished reservation and save it from falling into government hands upon her death. In Revenge of the Pequots, journalist Kim Isaac Eisler tells the remarkable story of how Richard "Skip" Hayward, then an unemployed ship-worker, granted his grandmother's dying wish, revived the moribund clan, and transformed the Pequots into the richest and most influential band of Native Americans in history.

Established in 1992, Foxwoods Resort and Casino is the world's most profitable gambling establishment, grossing over $1 billion a year at its sprawling complex in the backwoods of Ledyard, Connecticut. Making use of arcane laws and court decisions never intended to benefit Native Americans as they have, Hayward brilliantly laid the groundwork for this staggering economic empire. In a story rife with drama, he challenged a succession of Connecticut governors and such worthy adversaries as casino moguls Steve Wynn and Donald Trump, while forming alliances with Malaysian industrialist Lim Goh Tong, renegade Seminole chief James Billie, and President Bill Clinton. As a result of Hayward's strategizing, for one of the few times in history -- and in a truly ironic reversal -- the bizarre legal structure governing Native Americans actually worked to their advantage in a mainstream enterprise. But the Pequots' meteoric rise to fortune has left many wondering: Is this turnabout fair play?

In this riveting rags-to-riches tale, Eisler deftly explores the wide-ranging issues that have framed the great Native American casino debate and the ramifications of the Native American casino boom in a nation still uneasy about its roots.Amazon.com Review
Kim Isaac Eisler begins Revenge of the Pequots with a fascinating anecdote: a 1994 phone call between President Clinton and Skip Hayward, the chief of Connecticut's Pequot tribe. Here was the most powerful man in the country thanking Hayward for political campaign contributions totaling half a million dollars--a dramatic reversal from the standard story of American Indians begging the federal government for financial assistance. Eisler calls the incredible Pequot story "one of the greatest about-faces in American history, [how] this obscure Indian tribe, which in 1994 had been federally recognized for only ten years and numbered fewer than 200 people, had nothing if not plenty of cash."

They were (and are) the richest tribe in the United States, and they've done it all on gambling proceeds. The Foxwoods High Stakes Bingo and Casino complex, located in southeastern Connecticut, is "one of the most successful cash-producing enterprises in the world," says Eisler, and a destination for some 25,000 gamblers every day. The entrepreneurial Hayward is at the center of the book's plot, along with a talented lawyer named Tom Tureen, as they carefully go about winning federal recognition for the Pequots and then building Foxwoods. All of this was extremely controversial, with questions about the legitimacy of the Pequots' claims and the probity of their business. (Eisler is considerably more sympathetic to their story than another book on the same subject, Jeff Benedict's Without Reservation.)

The remote descendants of the Pequots had exacted from the system more than a small dose of revenge. They had turned a government, which for four centuries had committed brutal acts of oppression and termination, into knots. Using the same legal processes that had been used against American Indians for so long, they had trumped the ruling class and implausibly become the wealthiest Indian tribe in the history of North America.... Skeptics could and would argue endlessly about whether the new Pequots were or were not authentic Indians, although no one had questioned their right to declare themselves Pequots when they were poor.

Customer Reviews (7)

Shallow and Vapid
As the two-star authors wrote, this book has very little substance. It's a soft, air brushed account of the tribe and frankly not very engaging. Eisler is a poor writer. While he is clearly literate, he does not write in a compelling way nor does the story necessary hang together. It seems without focus and depth and that he just cut various facts and excerpts from other publications and glued them together to form this book. His writing lacks passion, intellectual rigor, and compelling narrative. This book is adequate, but I am giving it one star rating for paying $10 for what is essentially puffery. This book is probably worth pennies from a dime store.I would not recommend this book for an indepth understanding of the Pequots. Frankly, I want my money back.

A Superficial Effort
This book relies entirely too much on clips from previously published sources. In addition, the authors did not interview many tribal members or people who aided this tribe get on the map. It feels like a book the author was simply rushing to finish. Too bad.

I Wish
This is the book I wish I had written -- but I never would have spent the time and effort on research that the writer did. As a Ledyard-based reporter in the early 1970s, I knew about that part of town referred to as the Indian Reservation, and I'd heard of the only old lady who lived there in a trailer, and her occasional grandchildren. Trouble is, in four years I never had the slightest inclination to write about her or the land or the story behind either. Nonetheless, as the casino developed, I was pleased that someone was beating city hall. In painstaking detail the author tells how it happened, including a good bit of history. It's a serious book, not just a compilation of gossip. An interesting part of Americana. But as Ledyard today tries to deal with all the traffic and tourists, I can't help but remember the hundreds of meetings I sat through where the town fathers agonized over how to attract visitors and to expand the town's economic base. The leader of the Historical Society was sure that restoring the vertical saw mill would do draw crowds. He never could have imagined that the answer could have been found in that trailer on that reservation at the far end of town!

Funny, ironic, fascinating
I always wondered how Foxwoods came to be. Now I know thanks to this witty and ironic account, which the Boston Globe says is far more accurate and attentive to the facts than the other book on the topic. Also contains a lot of good insight into gambling, why people gamble, and unlike a lot of non fiction, it doesnt bog you down. Great book!

What a Letdown
After reading the terriffic "Without Reservation", I egarly anticipated getting another detailed view of how this "tribe" became what it is today.Unfortunately, I got a "soft" account of what happened in this author's view and IMO completely whitewashed the story behind the story:how government at all levels engaged in dereliction of duty and gross negligence in allowing this group to gain the recognition and power it has secured.

While the author does an OK good job of linking many of the favorable aspects of the court rulings to the "tribes" generous gifts to the DNC and Bill Clinton, he fails to delve into the corruption and naivite of the State and Federal governments and how this was a direct driver of the final outcome.

In fact, the author whitewashes a fundamental aspect of this "sovergn nation"- whether they acutally qualify as an Indian tribe according to clear Federal criteria on the subject.

If you want a "soft" and relatively "warm" view on the birth of the Foxwoods windfall, one that is short on details and long on political-correctness, you might enjoy this read.If you want a much more compelling and believable account of this situation, I suggest you read Mr. Benedict's "Without Reservation".You'll be glad you did. ... Read more

Product Description
"This certainly is a pioneering and original work . . . [that] in many ways stands alone. . . . The author's documentary and archival support base is massive. I find his arguments convincing and well based."--Murdo J. MacLeod, Graduate Research Professor of History, University of FloridaThe first century of Spanish colonization in Latin America witnessed the birth of cities that, while secondary to great metropolitan centers such as Mexico City and Lima, became important hubs for regional commerce. Santiago de Guatemala, the colonial capital of Central America, was one of these. A multiethnic and multicultural city from its beginning, Santiago grew into a vigorous trading center for agrarian goods such as cacao and cattle hides. With the wealth this commerce generated, Spaniards, natives, and African slaves built a city that any European of the period would have found familiar. This book provides a more complete picture of society, culture, and economy in sixteenth-century Santiago de Guatemala than has ever before been drawn. Robinson Herrera uses previously unstudied primary sources, including testaments, promissory notes, and work contracts, to recreate the lives and economic activities of the non-elite sectors of society, includingnatives, African slaves, economically marginal Europeans, and people of mixed descent. His focus on these groups sheds light on the functioning of the economy at the lower levels and reveals how people of different ethnic groups formed alliances to create a vibrant local and regional economy based on credit. This portrait of Santiago also increases our understanding of how secondary Spanish American cities contributed vitally to the growth of the colonies. ... Read more