A new book by Curt Stager and David Fadden, “The First Adirondackers: 12,000 Years of Indigenous Peoples in the Adirondack Uplands,” makes its purpose clear. The authors are, respectively, a Paul Smiths College professor and the third-generation director of Six Nations Iroquois Cultural Center in Onchiota. They make an impassioned plea for understanding that Indigenous peoples have long populated the North Country region.

I’m one of those people Fadden thinks about when he points out the fallacies of such classic sources as Alfred Donalson’s two-volume “History of the Adirondacks.” My views on Donaldson are a bit less harsh, as I assume changing resources and insights will continually mandate revisions in written history. But the point is well taken. Far too many have repeated Donaldson’s assertions that Indigenous peoples never lived in these mountains without critically analyzing the concept.

Chapters begin with sequential hypotheses of how life might have been lived along St. Regis Lake during different eras since the last Ice Age. Geologic, topographic and forest changes are outlined, along with some reasoned speculations on daily life and seasonal patterns. The narrative is laced with archaeological findings, both in the Adirondacks and elsewhere in the northeast. Who knew a 13,000-year-old musk ox bone was found near Elizabethtown, or a beluga whale outside Burlington and a ringed seal in Plattsburgh?

We’re introduced to scientific methods. Carbon-14 dating will be familiar to many, mass spectrometry perhaps less so. It’s impressive what can be learned from pottery fragments about foods with which they have had contact. Sediment core samples, pollen analysis and basic concepts of stratigraphy are complementary sources of information.

Some early artifacts have been found at spots with which I’m very familiar. It makes me wonder if better powers of observation might have made me alert to spear points, pieces of chert, primitive stone tools, ceramic shards, even a dugout canoe.

The authors make the case that one reason so little has been found in the region is that investigators haven’t assiduously looked. Adirondack terrain is not as easily accessed as many other areas of the northeast. And we aren’t close to established centers of archaeological study. Some important recent findings by SUNY Plattsburgh faculty members looking at close-by areas help change that.

The book is bookended by a lyrical rendition of the Haudenosossee creation story, and a final chapter by Fadden looking at current issues of native peoples. The latter, though engaging and well-written, feels like it should be the beginning of another book, not the coda to this one.

An appendix offers arguments against assertions that no early peoples lived or settled in the Adirondack region. There is no index, a feature I would have appreciated. Helpful maps, and some excellent color illustrations (likely created by Fadden but not specifically credited in the book) are included.

“The First Adirondackers” offers a scientific and spiritual journey through environmental history and cultural tradition. Archaeologic and historic concepts are supplemented with thoughts on land ethics, value of community and importance of resourcefulness and resilience.

Correcting history is no simple task. The authors are both imaginative and thorough in presenting their information. They readily point out how much remains to be learned. I’ll look forward to more research in the future.