Walter Hildebrandt and Brian Hubner explain why the Cypress Hills, 2,600 square kilometre plateau straddling the western Canada-US border, were an important gathering place for Aboriginal peoples for thousands of years, and why the Canadian government didn't want them there. The First Nations and the Métis came because game and lodge pole pine were plentiful. Fur traders came too, and as The Cypress Hills shows, the clashes between these different worlds lead to the 1873 massacre.