March 24: Metacom’s Resistance: Re-telling King Philip’s War and Its Legacy

Tuesday, March 24, 2026
6:00pm – 7:30pm
Cambridge Public Library, 449 Broadway and online
Free

The Past is Now: An Intertribal Panel on King Philip’s War, Past and Present

Is King Philip’s War really part of the past? Four Indigenous speakers tell us that it’s still deeply present.

People who are not Indigenous often think of Metacom’s Resistance – more commonly known as King Philip’s War – if they know of it – as part of a distant past. If we have read children’s stories of an idealized colonial life, or educated with traditional textbooks, we might think of the war as a single violent chapter in an otherwise quaint, albeit colorful, history, with colonial heroes bravely conquering their enemies.

Historical markers dotting the New England countryside, especially in Massachusetts, reinforce this idea: it was brutal, but the colonists emerged victorious, and in any event it was long ago – nothing to do with life today. For Indigenous communities, the past is not so easily left behind – and nor should it be for non-Indigenous people. We all live today with its aftermath. King Philip’s War continues to shape daily life, experience, and memory.

Panelists include:

• Hartman Deetz, Mashpee Wampanoag
• Brad Lopes, Aquinnah Wampanoag 
• Brittney Walley, Hassanamisco Nipmuc
• Elizabeth Solomon, Massachusett at Ponkapoag, moderator

On the eve of the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution, this panel invites audiences to grapple with a foundational war of Indigenous resistance on its 350th anniversary – and to see that it is not past, but deeply present, for us all.

This talk is presented in collaboration with Partnerships of Historic Bostons and the Cambridge Public Library.

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Want to brush up on the history of the conflict? Watch this video!