“Recommended… Schmader employs interdisciplinary methods to masterfully reconstruct this war, detailing the inventory of weapons and materiel available to combatants, examining the distinct climatic and environmental conditions at the time of Coronado's Expedition, and providing a meticulous survey of sites and artifacts from archaeological sites in New Mexico. Generously illustrated with maps and images, this book is a welcome addition to the historical study of early America and early modern history more broadly.”

– J. M. Starling, Choice

“A masterpiece of archaeological research. . . . Uncovering America’s First War is the definitive study of one of the most important places in the US Southwest: the ancestral Tiwa village of Piedras Marcadas Pueblo. Chronicling Schmader’s decades of exhaustive research, this book is a must-read for anyone interested in New Mexican history, the Coronado expedition, and Pueblo negotiations of early colonialism.”

– Matthew Liebmann, author of Revolt: An Archaeological History of Pueblo Resistance and Revitalization in 17th Century New Mexico

“Schmader’s command of archaeological, ethnohistorical, geographical, and oral history literature takes what once was the ephemeral evidence of Coronado’s entrada and makes it into a clearly marked trail in the heart of the American Southwest. With the approach of the quincentennial observations of this event, it will be Schmader’s work that will illuminate the worlds of Coronado and his army and that of the Puebloan Peoples he encountered.”

– Russell K. Skowronek, coeditor of The Civil War on the Rio Grande, 1846–1876

“Schmader’s command of archaeological, ethnohistorical, geographical, and oral history literature takes what once was the ephemeral evidence of Coronado’s entrada and makes it into a clearly marked trail in the heart of the American Southwest. With the approach of the quincentennial observations of this event, it will be Schmader’s work that will illuminate the worlds of Coronado and his army and that of the Puebloan Peoples he encountered.”

– Russell K. Skowronek, coeditor of The Civil War on the Rio Grande, 1846–1876

"If I had to sum up this book in one word, it would be 'rich.' It is rich in historical context, in archaeological data and illustrations, and in ethnography... Schmader has done an amazing job of presenting extensive new evidence in a well-written treatise that is a must-read for anyone interested in European colonialism in the American Southwest."

– Douglas K. Boyd, American Antiquity

"Schmader’s Uncovering America’s First War is a tour de force that will be hard to ignore... The book will be very valuable to historians and archaeologists working on early American history, Indigenous warfare, and the archaeology of colonial violence, and it offers a powerful example of interdisciplinary scholarship in regions where written sources are incomplete, biased, or missing altogether."

– David Rex Galindo, William and Mary Quarterly