NATIVE AMERICAN WAYS

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2010-03-05T14:39:00.001-08:00

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Looking for Co-Author(s)

2010-01-13T12:12:00.000-08:00

Friends,

The NATIVE AMERICAN WISDOM website has existed since 2004 with what I feel has been a high degree of quality information on American Indian history, culture and -- yes, wisdom.

During its most popular period, this site averaged over 200 unique visitors a day. That number has fallen to about 80 unique visitors a day, mostly due to my inability to spend the time necessary to add new content.

So, rather than let the website just wither away, I am seeking a co-author who could work with me to keep adding important educational, historical, cultural and spiritual material particular to Native American Peoples.

My co-author would have a high level of independence. Coding and specific technological expertise is not necessary. I can help with that. The person (or persons) I am looking for should really only have a desire to share Native American Wisdom to the Earth, at large, and have the time to regularly post to the website.

If you are interested in becoming a co-author, please email me at malcolm @ legendarysurfers.com -- I have stretched the email out to thwart the spammers, but I'm sure you can figure out what the real address is. I look forward to hearing from you!

( Ko'o'shup, Chumash cave painting site about an hour's drive away )

Thanksgiving Origins & Menu

2009-11-25T11:20:00.000-08:00

To learn more about Thanksgiving Day, please go to:

Teaching About Thanksgiving

Where Did Thanksgiving Come From?

American Indian peoples, Europeans, and other cultures around the world often celebrated the harvest season with feasts to offer thanks to higher powers for their sustenance and survival.

In 1541 Spaniard Francisco Vásquez de Coronado and his troops celebrated a "Thanksgiving" while searching for New World gold in what is now the Texas Panhandle.

Later such feasts were held by French Huguenot colonists in present-day Jacksonville, Florida (1564), by English colonists and Abnaki Indians at Maine's Kennebec River (1607), and in Jamestown, Virginia (1610), when the arrival of a food-laden ship ended a brutal famine.

(Related: "Four Hundred-Year-Old Seeds, Spear Change Perceptions of Jamestown Colony.")

But it's the 1621 Plimoth Thanksgiving that's linked to the birth of our modern holiday. The truth is the first "real" Thanksgiving happened two centuries later.

Everything we know about the three-day Plimoth gathering comes from a description in a letter wrote by Edward Winslow, leader of the Plimoth Colony, in 1621, Monac said.

It had been lost for 200 years and was rediscovered in the 1800s, she added.

In 1841 Boston publisher Alexander Young printed Winslow's brief account of the feast and added his own twist, dubbing it the "First Thanksgiving."

In Winslow's "short letter, it was clear that [the 1621 feast] was not something that was supposed to be repeated again and again. It wasn't even a Thanksgiving, which in the 17th century was a day of fasting. It was a harvest celebration."

But after its mid-1800s century appearance, Young's designation caught on—to say the least.

U.S. President Abraham Lincoln declared Thanksgiving Day a national holiday in 1863. He was probably swayed in part by magazine editor Sarah Josepha Hale—the author of the nursery rhyme "Mary Had a Little Lamb"—who had suggested Thanksgiving become a holiday, historians say.

In 1941 President Franklin Roosevelt established the current date for observance, the fourth Thursday of November.

What Was on the First Thanksgiving Menu?

Little is known about the first Thanksgiving dinner in the Plimoth (also spelled Plymouth) Colony in October 1621, attended by some 50 English colonists and about 90 native Wampanoag men in what is now Massachusetts.

We do know that the Wampanoag killed five deer for the feast, and that the colonists shot wild fowl—which may have been geese, ducks, or turkey. Some form, or forms, of Indian corn were also served.

But Jennifer Monac, spokesperson for the living-history museum Plimoth Plantation said the feasters likely supplemented their venison and birds with fish, lobster, clams, nuts, and wheat flour, as well as vegetables such as pumpkin, squash, carrots, and peas.

"They ate seasonally," Monac said, "and this was the time of the year when they were really feasting. There were lots of vegetables around, because the harvest had been brought in."

Traditional Thanksgiving fare that certainly wasn't on the table: potatoes, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie.

If you want to eat like a Pilgrim yourself, try some of the Plimoth Plantation's recipes, including stewed pompion (pumpkin) or traditional Wampanoag succotash.

[ The above from National Geographic: Thanksgiving Facts

Ancient Mounds of Ohio

2009-10-13T12:02:00.000-07:00

A website detailing the Newark, Ohio, earthworks is excellent: ancientohiotrail.org

[ From: "Ancient Ohio Trail - Travel overland or via the Web to the historic places of south-central Ohio" By Stephanie Woodard, Indian Country Today correspondent, Jul 14, 2009 ]

A new Web site, ancientohiotrail.org, offers a 21st century way to discover little-known historic places in the wooded hills and lush farmland of south-central Ohio: Hundreds of Native American earthworks ranging in age from 550 to 3,000 years old. Hidden in plain sight in cities, towns, fields and even backyards are solitary mounds, or artificial hills; animal forms sculpted into hilltops; and monumental earthen-walled complexes in the form of precisely sculpted circles, octagons, squares and free-form shapes enclosing scores, or even hundreds, of acres.

“Native people quietly visit these sacred places with prayers, sage, and tobacco to honor the ancients who built them, and to let the spirits know they are not forgotten.” -Marti L. Chaatsmith, Comanche/Choctaw and program coordinator of the Newark Earthworks Center

The Web site provides maps, photographs, links to tourism information, a free travel brochure, and videos you can watch on a computer (choose MP4 format) or download to your cell phone. The electronic Ancient Ohio Trail was put together by a consortium, including University of Cincinnati’s Center for the Electronic Reconstruction of Historical and Archaeological Sites, Ohio State University’s Newark Earthworks Center, and Ohio Historical Society. The easy-to-use site is worth a visit; junior high and high school teachers will find it an attractive, informative, respectfully written classroom tool.

It’s important to get information about these sites to the public, according to Carol Welsh, Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate and executive director of Native American Indian Center of Central Ohio. “Native people can take pride in them, and they show non-Native people the richness and complexity of our heritage.” She and her husband, Mark Welsh, Ihanktonwan Dakota and NAICCO program director, are part of a team assembled by the Newark Earthworks Center to give tours of sites in Newark, Ohio.

“It may not be widely understood that Ohio was once a center of Indian country,” said Marti L. Chaatsmith, Comanche/Choctaw and program coordinator of the Newark Earthworks Center. “Indigenous people lived here long before 2000 BCE and built earthworks into the landscape to mark the progression of the moon or the sun with ceremony.”

At once massive modifications of the land and masterpieces of subtlety, the grass-covered forms rise gently from their surroundings. Some of the best-known – the Newark Earthworks, Serpent Mound, Fort Ancient and Hopewell Culture National Historical Park/Mound City, all in south-central Ohio – are being considered for inclusion in UNESCO’s list of World Heritage Sites, where they would join the Great Wall of China, Chartres Cathedral and other notable places.

The ancient Ohioans’ imagination encompassed not just architecture and astronomy, but also the adornment of their personal and ritual lives. They made shirts and dresses of hide and woven plant fibers and embroidered them with thousands of freshwater pearls and shells. They also fabricated stone statuary and pipes, copper jewelry and headdresses, trumpets and other musical instruments, pottery and ghostly open hands made from sheets of translucent mica. Though the ancients left no written language to let us know what they called themselves or how they thought of their vast and varied material culture, they survive in the oral histories of contemporary Native communities.

“Native people who recognize their blood connection with the ancients quietly visit these sacred places with prayers, sage, and tobacco to honor the ancients who built them, and to let the spirits know they are not forgotten,” Chaatsmith said.

Here’s a quick look at what you’ll find on the Ancient Ohio Trail. Recent budget cuts have meant that open hours have been curtailed; before you go, check current days and times:

Newark Earthworks: The Octagon

For two millenia, the Octagon has framed a view of the lunar standstill: The moment when the moon rises at the northernmost point of its 18.61-year cycle. In 2006, I watched this moment with a small group organized by the Newark Earthworks Center. Surrounded by the hulking walls, we faced the opening in the Octagon through which the moon would appear. Behind us was the flat-topped mound where the ancients likely stood to watch this event. Just after midnight, a brilliant white crescent soared into the velvet-black sky. This experience has, however, been clouded by contention since 1910, when a country club leased the site and began building a golf course on top of the earthworks. The course remains in use to this day, to the consternation of many. (125 North 33rd St.; Newark, Ohio 43055; (740) 364-9584; earthworks@osu.edu)

Newark Earthworks: The Great Circle

Inside this immense walled enclosure, you feel far from the modern world, though you’re in the middle of a busy city. The Octagon and the Great Circle were once part of the world’s largest set of geometric earthworks. The grouping covered four square miles and encompassed many other forms, now mostly gone, including parallel walls that were likely ceremonial passageways. Native people tend to agree with archaeologist Bradley Lepper, who believes that one of the passages extended 64 miles to connect with earthworks in Chillicothe. Recently archaeologist William Romaine reported that on the summer solstice this passage matches the path of the Milky Way. (455 Hebron Road, State Route 79, Heath, Ohio, 43056; (740) 364-9584; earthworks@osu.edu)

Serpent Mound

This 1,000-year-old, 1,330-foot-long snake is the largest effigy earthwork in the world. Sculpted into a grassy hilltop, its gently rounded coils are about 20 feet wide and three feet high and align with various celestial events. A footpath leads you along its body to the head, which overlooks gently rolling hills and aligns with the summer solstice sunset. Once at the head, you’ll see that the snake’s open mouth is swallowing something oval. (3580 Route 73; Peebles, Ohio 45660; (937) 587-2796; www.ohiohistory.org)

Fort Ancient

Around 2,000 years ago, using deer shoulder blades and other tools, this place’s builders sliced the top off an hourglass-shaped 125-acre bluff. Using the resulting 553,000 cubic yards of dirt, they enclosed the space – one basket-load at a time over several centuries – with 18,000 feet of undulating earthen walls. Today, as in ancient times, you enter via a gateway at the site’s north end, proceed through the northern lobe of the hourglass, traverse a narrow, walled-in land bridge, and finally arrive at the southern lobe. There the site opens up to a glorious, panoramic view of the wooded river valley below. (6123 State Route 350; Oregonia, Ohio 45054; (513) 932-4421 or (800) 283-8904; www.ohiohistory.org).

Mannahatta

2009-09-03T10:54:00.000-07:00

Mannahatta -- Manhattan -- before the Europeans arrived (1609 A.D.).:

Mannahatta, 1609 A.D.

Earth Family

2009-05-19T12:16:00.000-07:00

"It's not a resource. It's a family."

Native American Statehood

2009-01-19T08:33:00.000-08:00

A great idea... Let's dream big:

--------------------------------

[From: "A state for Native Americans?" by Andy Harvey - Jan. 16, 2009, 12 News, Phoenix, Arizona - see video on page, also. ]

Could the United States get a 51st state? That's what a Northern Arizona man is proposing. While living on the Navajo Indian reservation, Mark Charles came up with the idea.

"It was very striking to me how here we were in the middle of the United States, technology, community, government all around us and yet it felt like the country had no idea we were there,” Charles said.

And when the presidential candidates were campaigning, Charles said they didn’t pay attention to the Native American vote, especially since tribes have a unique relationship with the federal government through treaties unlike other minority groups. So that’s when the Navajo man started asking questions on what can be done to give Native Americans a stronger presence in Washington D.C.

"What can we do to take a place at the table where we can make decisions about our own lands and people and history and communities?" Charles said.

He came up with the idea to establish a Native American state.

"It would be a state for people who are enrolled members of tribes," Charles said.

The state would be virtual and wouldn’t involve rearranging any land. It would represent members from over 500 federally recognized tribes. According to the U.S. Census, nearly 4 million people claim to be Native American.

"That would put us, that population in ranking of order of a state somewhere in between 25 and 35 with 1 being the largest," Charles said.

The state would also get electoral votes and congressional leaders.

"Who could go and be a part of congress to have the ability to introduce bills and have the ability to object when things are brought up and funding is being cut from Native American programs," Charles said.

However, creating a new state is a long shot according to ASU law professor Robert Clinton.

"Essentially the state can't be carved out of existing states and all of the Indian reservations now are in existing states," Clinton said.

Clinton, who’s worked with several Native American tribes, said the idea isn’t new. Back in the 19th century, there were talks about establishing such a state by the federal government.

"There were proposals for an Indian state in the Indian territory, but that never happened," Clinton said.

Today, it would take approval of state lawmakers to allow such a state to be formed, but Clinton thinks this would never happen.

"This is one of those ideas that was a terrific idea before the states were admitted. Once they were admitted because of that provision it becomes constitutionally almost impossible to accomplish," Clinton said.

Still, Charles wants to start a dialogue. The Fort Defiance resident plans to travel to different reservations and talk to community members and tribal leaders about his idea. He said he’s already been contact by different members from across the country.

"I want us to think creatively outside the box. What can we do to give ourselves a voice?" he said.

----------------------------

Reservations map can be viewed and/or downloaded. Large file, give it time to load:

Reservations Map

146th Annniversary of Mass Hanging

2008-12-25T10:54:00.000-08:00

... about 50 Native Americans... [have ridden] horseback into the Mankato area... Their arrival will mark the end of a nearly 300 mile trip to mark the 146th anniversary of the largest mass execution in U.S. history.

Photo courtesy of MPR

Minnisota Public Radio has images from the ride, an audio broadcast and blog post about:

The 300 mile of reconciliation over the mass hanging of Dakota people in 1862.

'The group has endured blizzards and long stretches of below zero temperatures in their journey from the Missouri River to the Minnesota River.

'They saddled up again this morning in southwest Minnesota for one of the last legs of what they call a ride of reconciliation.

'St. Paul, Minn. — About two inches of overnight snow was waiting for the riders as they assembled on the wacipi, or powwow grounds, of the Lower Sioux Community. Trailers, pickup trucks and dozens of people were on hand to help feed, water and brush the horses.

'One of the people saddling up is Jim Miller. Miller lives on the Pine Ridge reservation in western South Dakota. He says despite the rough weather, the riders enthusiasm is undiminished.

'Jim Miller: "I'm amazed at the young guys," Miller says. "They're up and ready to go. We as the elders, we kind of have to talk them down, you know? They wanted to ride in the blizzard, they're just game."

'Miller says he started the ride in 2005 after dreaming about a riderless horse and other symbols he linked to the mass execution in Mankato. An ancestor of his was among those executed.

'The hangings followed the Dakota-U.S. War of 1862 which began just a couple miles away from where Miller stands. On Dec. 26, 1862, victorious federal officials hanged 38 Dakota men as punishment for a war that took hundreds of lives.

'Miller says the pain of that conflict still linger among families on both sides of the war.

'"I want to make a statement that we're the first to apologize, for our part in the war," Miller says. "What the federal government and what the state does is up to them. And we're here on one condition, and that's love for all people. We have to share this planet together and let's do it with love."

'Miller's message of reconciliation is what the event is all about -- bridging gaps between cultures. Miller says when a blizzard stranded the riders for two days in Howard, S.D., the residents he calls non-natives helped out, providing extra feed for the horses.

'In southwest Minnesota, Theresa Welu says her family agreed to put the riders up for a night on their farm near the town of Milroy.

'Theresa Welu: "They were so set on making something better," Welu says. "And their message of peace and hope and strength and trying to help their people reconcile with everyone else, it was just a wonderful thing and we were so glad to play a small part in their ride through here."

'Back on the Lower Sioux, the riders are leaving the powwow grounds, ready to travel county roads on the day's planned 18-mile trip.

'The area was the homeland for the Dakota before the 1862 war. The war started after the U.S. government failed to meet its treaty obligations.

'After the war, the Dakota were driven out of Minnesota, resettling mainly in Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota and Canada.

'Yvonne Wynde's family was among those forced out. Today, her grandson's are among the riders. She says she hopes they learn a little history on the journey.

'Yvonne Wynde: "To see all these names, Lac Qui Parle, Birch Coulee, Wood Lake; what happened here? Really want to become better educated in terms of the American public educational system and the Dakota educational system that I think happens more in the homes than in the schools," says Wynde.

'Wynde says the effects of the 1862 war still linger today, not only in the displacement of the Dakota people, but also in the poverty that followed.

'Once the riders are on the road through Lower Sioux, the history Wynde is interested in is all around.

'They pass by the warehouse where the fighting started in 1862. They'll spend the night at Fort Ridgely, scene of a major battle in the war. Then it's on to Mankato. The group will hold a ceremony there Friday near the execution site.

'More than a decade ago the city renamed the location Reconciliation Park.'

Sitting Bull and the Ghost Dance

2008-12-10T13:15:00.000-08:00

A video documentary on Sitting Bull and the Ghost Dance:

Sitting Bull and the Ghost Dance

Prophesies 1

2008-12-05T09:53:00.000-08:00

"Time evolves and comes to a place where it renews again. There is first a purification time. Then there is renewal time. We are getting really close to this time now. We were told, we would see America come and go. In a sense America is dying, from within. Because we forgot the instructions on how to live on earth..."

"... Time evolves and comes to a place where it renews again. There is first a purification time. Then there is renewal time. We are getting really close to this time now. We were told, we would see America come and go. In a sense America is dying, from within. Because we forgot the instructions on how to live on earth.

"Everything is coming to a time where prophesy and man's inability to live on earth in a spiritual way will come to a crossroad of great problems. It's the Hopi belief, it's our belief that if you are not spiritually connected to the earth, understand the spiritual reality on how to live on the earth, it's likely you will not make it.

"When Columbus came that began what we term as the first world war. Because along with him came everybody from Europe. By the end of the second world war, we were in America only 800,000 from 60 million to 800,000. We were almost exterminated in America.

"Everything is spiritual. Everything has a spirit. Everything is brought to you by a Creator. One Creator. Some people call Him God, some people call Him Buddha, some people call Him Allah, some people call Him other names. We call Him Grandfather.

"We're here on earth only a few winters, then we go to the spirit world. The spirit world is more real than most of us believe. The spirit world is everything. Over 95% of our bodies is water. In order to stay healthy, you have to drink good water. When the European first came here, Columbus, we could drink out of any river. If the Europeans had lived the Indian way when they came here, we would still be drinking the water. Why? Because water is sacred. The air is sacred.

"Our DNA is made of the same DNA as the tree. The tree breathes what we exhale. When the tree exhales, we need what the tree exhales. So, we have a common destiny with the tree. We are all from the earth. When the earth, the water, the atmosphere is corrupted, then it will create its own reaction. Mother is reacting. In the Hopi prophesy they say the storms and floods will become greater.

"To me it's not a negative thing to know that there will be great changes. It's not negative. It's evolution. When you look at it as evolution, it's time. Nothing stays the same.

"You should learn how to plant something, that's the first connection. You should treat all things as spirit and realize that we are ONE family. It's never something like the end. It's like life, there is no end to life."

Making Peace with Thanksgiving

2008-11-19T08:37:00.000-08:00

[ From Seattle Post-Intelligencer, "Making peace with Thanksgiving," by Kery Murakami, November 17, 2008 ]

( Wampanoag home block cut image courtesy of http://i157.photobucket.com/albums/t45/maggie6138/nativehouse.jpg )

James Rasmussen [ director of the Duwamish Longhouse and Cultural Center] was matter-of-fact... when asked how he plans to celebrate Thanksgiving.

"Just like anybody else," he said.

But he knew the question implied more, because he is a member of the Duwamish, and he was helping build the tribe's new longhouse in West Seattle.

After all, Thanksgiving may be a day for turkey and football for many, but it marks the beginning of the end and more than a twinge of betrayal for early Native Americans who helped the Pilgrims survive.

Rasmussen knew there was a political facet to the question, he said. "But on the scale of things that bother me, like (the Duwamish) not being federally recognized, Thanksgiving is pretty low on the list."

Certainly, there will be some Native Americans who boycott the holiday, as Elliott Wolfe, a descendant of the Sioux and Chippewa tribes, said he once considered.

He was in high school and was trying to learn about his heritage.

"I started looking into the history and the negative stuff. You learn how much back stabbing there was, and you hear about all the horrible, horrible things that happened, and it just got a little depressing," said Wolfe, now a junior studying construction management at the University of Washington.

But he went to Thanksgiving dinner that year anyway. "Just because I felt bitter about the holiday didn't mean I wanted to ruin it for everybody."

For all the negative associations, Wolfe and other Native Americans say they've forged their own memories and their own meaning for Thanksgiving -- and none of it has to do with Pilgrims.

"We usually go to my aunt's house or my parents' house," he said. "We all get together and share stories. Me and my cousins usually get into mischief. We have a big dinner. There's so many of us, we can't fit at any one table."

Wolfe said: "I think for most American Indians, it's just a time to spend with family. But you have that thought in the back of your mind. You like getting together but you almost wish there was another reason."

There was another reason to go to the dinner -- at some point, he had to move on or be lost in bitterness. Eventually, he stopped being part of a study group with other Native American students.

"I was catching myself with pessimistic attitudes and negative thoughts. There was nothing I could do about mainstream society whitewashing the history. I could complain about how technically my family should own hundreds of acres in the Midwest. But I could get a good job and buy some of that land back."

But although Native Americans have tried to find meaning in Thanksgiving, the day and the way it's taught in schools still can be a sore spot...

Marty Bluewater, executive director of the United Indians for All Tribes, which offers social services and runs the Native American Daybreak Star Cultural Center in Discovery Park... said United Indians tries to focus on the broader idea of Thanksgiving: sharing...

On Thanksgiving, Bluewater, who is Shawnee and Choctaw, will be with his mother and his nephews. They will barbecue a turkey. And they'll say a few Native prayers. "I'll try to take the good parts and make it a time for sharing," he said.

---------------------------

Further resources:

Teaching About Thanksgiving
http://ehighlights.hsd401.org/node/282

NEA Booklist

2008-11-13T09:41:00.000-08:00

To mark the 13th anniversary of Native American Heritage Month (November), the National Education Aassociation has released a recommended reading list for students in public schools that they call the "Native American Booklist." It is organized by grade level and includes fiction, non-fiction and poetry:

Grades K-4

* Baby Rattlesnake by Te Ata. Illustrated by Lynn Moroney. Children's Press (1991).
* A Boy Called Slow: The True Story of Sitting Bull by Joseph Bruchac. Putnam (1994)
* Crazy Horse's Vision by Joseph Bruchac. Illustrated by S.D. Nelson. Lee and Low Books (2000)
* The Boy Who Dreamed of an Acorn by Leigh Casler. Illustrated by Shonto Begay. Putnam Books (1994).
* Drumbeat?Heartbeat: A Celebration of the Powwow by Susan Braine. Lerner Publications (1995).
* Earth Daughter: Alicia of Acoma Pueblo by George Ancona. Macmillan (1995).
* Enduring Wisdom by Virginia Driving Hawk Sneave. Illustrated by Synthia St. James. Holiday House (2003).
* Full Moon Stories by Eagle Walking Turtle. Hyperion (1997).
* The Girl Who Loved Wild Horses by Paul Goble. Bradbury (1978).
* Giving Thanks: A Native American Good Morning Message by Jake Swamp and Erwin Printup. Lee and Low Books (1995).
* The Good Luck Cat by Joy Harjo. Illustrated by Paul Lee. Harcourt (2000).
* Grandmother's Dreamcatcher by Becky Ray McCain. Albert Whitman and Company (1998).
* Grandmother's Pigeon by Louise Erdrich. Hyperion Books (1996).
* Jingle Dancer by Cynthia Leitich Smith. Illustrated by Cornelius Wright. HarperCollins (2000).
* Knots on a Counting Rope by John Archambault. Illustrated by Ted Rand. Owlet (1997).
* The Legend of the White Buffalo Woman by Paul Goble. Illustrated by Paul Goble. National Geographic (1998).
* Less Than Half, More Than Whole by Kathleen LaCapa. Illustrated by Michael LaCapa. Northland Press (1994).
* The Magic Hummingbird translated by Ekkehart Malotki, narrated by Michael Lomatuway'Ma. Illustrated by Michael Lacapa. Kiva (1996).
* Mama, Do You Love Me? by Barbara M. Joose. Illustrated by Barbara LaVallee. Chronicle Books (1998).
* A Man Called Raven by Richard Van Camp. Illustrated by George Littlechild. Children's Book Press (1997).
* Many Nations: An Alphabet of Native America by Joseph Bruchac. Illustrated by Robert F. Goetzi. Northland Publishers (1996).
* My Arctic 1,2,3 by Michael Kusagak. Illustrated by Vladyana Krykorka. Annick Press (1996).
* Powwow by George Ancona. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich (1993).
* Return of the Buffaloes by Paul Goble. Illustrated by Paul Goble. National Geographic (1996).
* Sing Down the Rain by Judi Moreillon. Illustrated by Michael Chiago. Kiva Publishing (1997).
* Tallchief: America's Prima Ballerina by Maria Tallchief. Viking Press (1999).
* This Land is Your Land by George Littlechild. Children's Press (1993).
* What's the Most Beautiful Thing You Know About Horses? by Richard Van Camp. Illustrated by George Littlechild. Children's Book Press (1998).
* When the Rain Sings by the National Museum of the American Indian. Simon and Schuster Books for Young Readers (1999).

Grades 5-8

* Arctic Memories by Normee Ekoomiak. Holt (1988).
* Arrow Over the Door by Joseph Bruchac. Dial (1998).
* The Birchbark House by Louise Erdrich. Harper (1999).
* Children of the Sun: Stories by and About Indian Kids by Beverly Hungry Wolf. William Morrow (1998).
* Did You Hear Wind Sing Your Name? An Oneida Song of Spring by Sandra DeCoteau. Walker & Company (1995).
* Dancing Teepees: Poems of American Indian Youth by Virginia Driving Hawk Sneave. Holiday House (1988).
* Four Seasons of Corn: A Winnebago Tradition by Sally M. Hunter. Lerner (1997).
* Indian Shoes by Cynthia Leitich Smith. HarperCollins (2002).
* Navajo: Visions and Voices Across the Mesa by Shonto Begay. Illustrated by Shonto Begay. Scholastic (1995).
* Northern Lights: The Soccer Trails by Michael Kusugak. Illustrated by Vladyana Krykorka. Annick Press (1993).
* The Path of the Quiet Elk by Virginia Stroud. Dial Books (1999).
* Pushing Up the Sky by Joseph Bruchac. Dial Books for Young Readers (2000).
* Rain is Not My Indian Name by Cynthia Leitich Smith. HarperCollins (2001).
* Soul Would Have No Rainbow If the Eyes Had No Tears and Other Native American Proverbs by Guy A. Zona. Touchstone Books (1994).
* The Ways of My Grandmothers Beverly Hungry Wolf. William Morrow (1998).
* Wonderful Sky Boat and Other Native American Tales of the Southeast by Jane Louise Curry. Illustrated by James Watts. Margaret McElderry Books (2001).

Grades 9 and Up

* After and Before the Lightening by Simon Ortiz. University of Arizona Press (1994).
* Bloodlines: Odyssey of a Native Daughter by Janet Campbell Hale. University of Arizona Press (1993).
* Encyclopedia of American Indian Civil Rights by James Stuart Olson (editor), Mark Baxter (editor), Darren Pierson (editor), and Jason M. Tetzloff (editor). Greenwood (1997).
* Food and Spirits by Beth Brant. Oyate (1991).
* Full Moon on the Reservation by Gloria Bird. Greenfield Review Press (1998).
* A Gathering of Spirit: A Collection of North American Indian Women edited by Beth Brant. Firebrand Books (1989).
* Ghost Dance: New and Selected Poems by Dorise Seale. Oyate (2001).
* Green Grass, Running Water by Thomas King. Bantam (1993).
* Here First: Autobiographical Essays by Native American Writers edited by Arnold Krupet. Modern Library (2001).
* House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday. University of Arizona Press (1966).
* The Joe Leaphorn Series by Tony Hillerman. HarperCollins. (1989-2002).
* Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven by Sherman Alexie. HarperPerennial (1994).
* Power by Linda Hogan. W.W. Norton and Company (1999).
* Skeleton Man by Joseph Bruchac. HarperCollins (2001).
* Speaking for the Generations: Native Writers on Writing by Simon Ortiz. University of Arizona Press (1998).
* The Woman Who Watches the World by Linda Hogan. W.W. Norton and Company (2001).

Columbus, Cabot & Vespucci

2008-10-14T08:38:00.000-07:00

To be honest with you, Columbus Day is an anti-holiday for me. I still cannot believe that this
day is celebrated. It remains a very dark day for the world, on many levels.

Author David Boyle discussed his new book, "Toward the Setting Sun: Columbus, Cabot, Vespucci, and the Race for America" in an expansive NPR interview at:

Talking Columbus On Columbus Day : NPR

Miccosukee & Everglades Restoration

2008-10-10T08:58:00.000-07:00

In Southern Florida, there's a battle over a restoration plan for the Everglades. On one side: environmental groups, public officials, and sugar industry executives. On the other side: the Miccosukee, a small group of native Americans that actually live there.

NPR Audio | U.S. Sugar Tastes Sour To Everglades Tribe

Paquiqueneo

2008-10-01T13:09:00.000-07:00

James Horn. A Land as God Made It: Jamestown and the Birth of America. New York: Basic Books, 2005. xi + 289 pp. Illustrations, notes, and index. $26.00 (cloth); $15.95 (paper)

Horn announces that "the English were not the first Europeans to discover Virginia" (p. 1). In the summer of 1561, a Spanish ship was driven by storms into the Bay.

Proceeding inland, the Spaniards anchored along a river in order to gather supplies and repair their vessel, and there, on the banks of what may have been the Chickahominy, they encountered a small group of Indians, two of whom apparently "agreed" to board the ship and sail back to Europe with its crew.

One of these two, Paquiqueneo, was given the name of Don Luis de Velasco, under which title he was presented at Philip II's court in Madrid. Anxious to return to his homeland, Don Luis sailed to Mexico, where he accepted the Christian faith and spent several years living amongst Dominican friars.

Expressing a desire to establish a mission among his own people, Don Luis gained the support of the governor of Florida, Pedro Menendez de Aviles, and in 1570, accompanied by dozen Jesuits, he at last returned to his home. Once resettled among his people, Don Luis soon turned his back upon the missionaries, who struggled to survive a harsh winter, and in February 1571 the apostate and his supporters attacked the mission, killing all but one of its residents.

An enraged Menendez dispatched an expedition against his former comrade; unable to find Don Luis, he settled for unleashing a "chastisement" upon the Indians before returning to Florida.

Although the Spanish mission met a quick and brutal end, in Horn's view it cast a long shadow over future relations between Europeans and Virginia Indians. Menendez's attack acquainted the Indians with the fearsome nature of European warfare, and simultaneously served as a warning to rival European powers that Spain had laid its claims to North American territories as well as those to the south.

Perhaps more importantly, this moment of contact gave rise to tantalizing tales of the alleged wealth of this land, which Spanish mariners claimed was filled with easily accessible lodes of jewels and precious metals. All of these results were to have significant impact upon the next century's English colonial endeavors.

From this arresting opening, Horn moves on to examine the principal players and events that led to and followed the arrival of the small English fleet in 1607. He analyzes the statecraft of Wahunsonacock (whom the English knew as Powhatan) and Opechancanough, the pre-eminent leaders of the region that the Powhatans called Tsenacommacah and he provocatively argues that Opechancanough may have been none other than Don Luis/Paquiquineo (!) and lauds the skill by which these two brothers gained control of "great and spacious Dominions" (p. 20).

Malcolm's Recommendations

2008-02-02T10:09:00.002-08:00

I've added a link to Amazon.com that I will be updating periodically. The recommendations I make are based on 38 years of reading and traveling the Red Road. Pleas go to:

NATIVE AMERICAN WAYS @ Amazon.com

Tsenacommacah People

2008-01-30T12:01:00.000-08:00

This posting begins a series on people from Tenakomakah (Tsenacommacah), that area that included Powhatan country between what is now known as the James and York Rivers, which may have also been known by the Spanish as Ajacan, during the time of initial European contact.

"The sundry Marks of the Chief Men of Virginia"
By Theodore de Bry [probably after John White]
Engraving from book page
Plate 23 from "America," Part 1 (1st ed., Frankfurt, 1590–1607)
Image courtesy of www.vahistorical.org

No extant John White painting corresponds to this print. The caption explains the symbols as marks worn by men to show their affiliation: "whereby it may be known what Prince's subjects they be, or of what place they have their origin."

[The following is an excerpt from:]

Re-‘Interpreting’ the Role of the Cultural Broker in the Conquest of La Florida, 1513 - 1600

Considering the important part played by interpreters in facilitating contact, communication, cultural exchange, and conflict resolution in the early colonial period, there have been surprisingly few individual or collective historical biographies of these influential individuals.[1]Although a few anthropologists and historians recently have taken up the cause of these “conduits” of the colonial frontiers, many of their monographs tend to depict these individuals either as “victims”--“weathercocks buffeted by the shifting political winds in one or both cultures,” or as “heroes”--“master mediators” who had been “culturally-enlarged” into “150% men.”[2]While there is some truth to both of these views, neither characterization does justice to the colorful lives, complex roles, and checkered careers of the diverse peoples that ethnohistorians have begun to lump together under the generic label of“cultural brokers.”[3]To date, only one historian, Eugene Lyon, has directly addressed (if briefly) this important subject in the context of the Spanish borderlands frontier as this paper will endeavor to do in a more comprehensive manner.[4]

In examining the culturally ambiguous characters that served as interpreters in La Florida’s early contact period, it is not possible to construct a single composite portrait that would sufficiently represent the diversity of their motives, choices, and life experiences.On the other hand, at least six distinct types of interpreters may be identified: abducted Amerindians, captured and redeemed Castilian castaways, foreign prisoners, youthful catechists and missionaries, acculturated Indian caciques and cacicas, and Spanish garrison soldiers.As often as not, these individuals did not choose the career of cultural broker, but were kidnapped, enslaved, or compelled to assume the role of interpreter or intermediary by Spanish conquistadores and Indian caciques.Since the interpreter figured prominently in the negotiation of truces and peace-settlements, conquistadores and caciques had to be prepared either to win the go-betweens’ loyalty with generous gifts and kindnesses, or to coerce their cooperation with threats of punishment.Although the linguistic skills of these “middlemen” may have made them more sensitive to the cultural values of both parties, it is important to remember that the extraordinary individuals acting as mediators were ordinary men and women in pursuit of their own self-interest.Collectively, however, their individual actions and “personal dramas influenced, changed, and sometimes even dictated the course of colonial development.”[5]

------------------

[1].Many of the older generation of “patrician” historians writing about the conquest of the Americas extolled the virtues and trumpeted the accomplishments of a few “great white men” to the exclusion of all other voices and traditions.The histories they and their “consensus school” successors wrote considered only the deeds of the European “discoverers,” explorers, conquistadores, colonial founders, and missionaries as worthy of their pens and ignored or marginalized the more culturally ambiguous men and women of the borderlands frontier.Not surprisingly, the only full-length historical biographies written in this period about interpreters focused on European diplomats: Paul A. W. Wallace, Conrad Weiser, 1696-1760, Friend of Colonist and Mohawk (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1945) and Nicholas B. Wainwright, George Croghan: Wilderness Diplomat (Chapel Hill, N.C.: 1959).Only in the last year has any historian compared and contrasted the experiences of European and Native American interpreters in a single work.See James Hart Merrell, Into the American Woods: Negotiators on the Pennsylvania Frontier(New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1999).

[2].Anthropologist Malcom McFee was the first to argue that the bi-cultural individual had more options and less constraints in his article, “The 150% man: a product of Blackfoot acculturation,” American Anthropologist 70 (1968): 1096-1107; historian J. Frederick Fausz took the opposite view, depicting these individuals as “marginal men” in his article, “‘Middlemen in peace and war’: Virginia’s earliest Indian interpreters, 1608-1632,” published in the Journal of American History 75 (June 1988): 41-64.Anthropologist James A. Clifton quickly counter-attacked, debunking the “older popular stereotype” that “culturally marginalized people became psychologically diminished,” and arguing instead that as masters of two (or more) cultures, interpreters actually became “culturally enlarged.”See the introduction to his Being and Becoming Indian: Biographical Studies of North American Frontiers (Chicago: Dorsey Press, 1989), 28-29.Other historians have chosen--much like their “cultural broker” subjects--to straddle the fence between the warring camps, rather than take one side over the other.See, for example, Nancy L. Hagedorn and Alan Taylor’s characterization of a Stockbridge Mohican mediator, respectively published as “‘A friend to go between them’”: the interpreter as cultural broker during Anglo-Iroquois councils, 1740-1770,” Ethnohistory 35 (Winter 1988) and “Captain Hendrick Aupaumut: the dilemmas of an intercultural broker,” Ethnohistory 43:3 (Summer 1996).

[3].Historian Margaret Connell Szasz, ed., Between Indian and White Worlds: the Cultural Broker (Norman: London: University of Oklahoma Press, 1994), and linguist Frances Karttunen, ed. Between Worlds: Interpreters, Guides, and Survivors (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, c.1994) wisely ignored the debate altogether, and as a result have produced more informative and complex look at the varied lives, survival strategies, and experiences of the interpreters included in their studies.

[4].See “The captives of Florida,” and “Cultural brokers in sixteenth-century Spanish Florida,” in Eugene Lyon, ed., Pedro Menéndez de Avilés (New York: London: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1995), 171-190, 329-336.

[5].See the editors’ introduction in David G. Sweet and Gary B. Nash, ed., Struggle and Survival in Colonial America (Berkeley: University of California Press, c.1981), 1-13.

Ward Churchill

2007-06-27T10:54:00.000-07:00

Regents to vote on firing Ward Churchill. It's time to speak out.

In the next few weeks, the Board of Regents of the University of Colorado (CU) will vote on the dismissal of Professor Ward Churchill. This is the final opportunity for public input in this process.

Over the past two and a half years, many of you have opposed CU's attempts to fire Ward. Ward and I have engaged in this struggle not for the sake of his job (he will always write, speak and teach), nor because we enjoy battling bureaucracy, but because it has become emblematic of contemporary efforts to silence those who insist on discussing uncomfortable truths.

Since February 2005, CU administrators have been under intense political and financial pressure to fire Ward for his statements about the 9/11 attacks. To avoid blatantly violating the First Amendment, they have resorted to a pretextual investigation of his scholarship.

After combing through a media barrage of unfounded allegations and his more than 20 books, 100 articles, and over 12,000 footnotes, CU has settled for firing Ward Churchill, a tenured full professor, for six instances of alleged improper footnoting or author attribution (see details below).

Predictably, this has provided sufficient excuse for those who wish to distance themselves from this "controversy" and still believe they support academic freedom. For organizations like Lynne Cheney's neoconservative American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA), it is a major victory for the corporatization of higher education.

However, those who look beyond the headlines and CU's self-serving pronouncements have recognized it as a charade.

First, the evidence has established that all of the charges investigated were solicited or invented by University administrators. None were filed by the allegedly aggrieved parties.

The specific charges against Ward have been debunked. Recently, fifteen professors and two attorneys filed two sets of formal research misconduct allegations against the investigative committee which wrote the report used to justify sanctions. These illustrate that the committee members were so determined to convict Ward that they engaged in falsification and fabrication of evidence, twisting the facts to fit their conclusions. In addition, CU Professor Tom Mayer has exposed the pretextual nature of the so-called plagiarism charges.

More generally, Indigenous scholar/activists and their allies have recognized that this is an attack on those who challenge mainstream "truths" about U.S. history, as well as an attempt to eliminate ethnic and gender studies. Public intellectuals including Derrick Bell, Noam Chomsky, Richard Falk, Howard Zinn, and Immanuel Wallerstein published an open letter in the NY Review of Books denouncing CU's actions as part of the repressive post-9/11 "militarist reflex." A petition opposing Ward's dismissal was signed by nearly 500 scholars and activists with Teachers for a Democratic Society. Many other groups have submitted letters and petitions denouncing CU's tactics and calling for Ward's reinstatement.

What has meant the most to us, however, has been the support of elders like Carrie Dann of the Western Shoshone and Japanese American activist Yuri Kochiyama, young people who are searching for a way to cope with an uncertain future, and regular people on the street - parking lot attendants, baggage handlers, homeless people - who consistently express their appreciation that Ward refuses to be silenced. They know this is not about footnotes.

I hope you will take the time to e-mail the CU Regents and urge them not to fire Ward Churchill. They can be reached c/o Millie.Cortez@cu.edu , or individually at

Steve.Ludwig@cu.edu, Cindy.Carlisle@cu.edu, Patricia.Hayes@cu.edu, Michael.Carrigan@cu.edu, Tom.Lucero@cu.edu, Steve.Bosley@cu.edu, Kyle.Hybl@cu.edu, Paul.Schauer@cu.edu, Tillie.Bishop@cu.edu

(For maximum effectiveness, please cc: wcsn@gmail.com.)

We have no illusions that the Regents will suddenly wake up and decide to take academic freedom seriously. However, the resistance they encounter in firing Ward Churchill will determine how readily others will be subjected to similar treatment. Resistance is never futile, for it defines the terms of the next struggle.

In solidarity,

Natsu Taylor Saito

Boulder, Colorado

June 20, 2007

p.s. A brief outline of key facts and links follows. See also www.wardchurchill.net and www.defendcriticalthinking.org.

Key Facts in the Ward Churchill Case

The Charges :

CU's grounds for dismissal now consist solely of the charges that Prof. Churchill:

(1) failed to provide sufficient evidence that in the 1837 smallpox epidemic

(a) infected blankets were obtained from an infirmary;

(b) an Army doctor or post surgeon told the Mandans to scatter; and

(c) 400,000 people, as opposed to possibly 300,000, ultimately died;

(2) cited to material he has consistently acknowledged as ghostwritten;

(3) published an article in Z Magazine in which the editors, without telling him, deleted his attribution of co-authorship to "Dam the Dams;" and

(4) copyedited a piece in a book edited by a third party which, unbeknownst to him, plagiarized Fay Cohen.

The invalidity of each charge has been shown demonstrated by Prof. Churchill and numerous other scholars. But even if they were true, they illustrate the pretextual nature of the process. No prolific scholar could withstand such fine-tooth combing of his or her work.

The Bottom Line :

Recognizing that they could not fire Prof. Churchill directly for his political speech, CU administrators created a pretext to do so by soliciting/inventing "research misconduct" allegations. A biased investigation generated a handful of technical charges which the University has falsely labeled "plagiarism" or "fabrication of evidence." To date, external political and financial pressures have trumped the First Amendment and the principle of academic freedom at the University of Colorado.

Key Developments:

Feb. 2, 2005: then-Colorado Governor Bill Owens demands that Professor Ward Churchill be fired for his 2001 op-ed web posting on the 9/11 attacks.

Feb. 3, 2005: The Regents denounce Ward Churchill's statements and authorize then-Interim Chancellor Philip DiStefano to investigate "every word" he has published. Though billed as a public meeting, two people are arrested and prosecuted for attempting to speak in support of Prof. Churchill.

Mar. 3, 2005: Then-President Betsy Hoffman warns the Boulder Faculty Assembly of a "new McCarthyism," pointing out that there is "no question that there's a real danger that the group of people [who] went after Prof. Churchill now feel empowered." Within 5 days Pres. Hoffman announces her resignation.

Mar. 24, 2005: Interim Chancellor DiStefano, who has never bothered to inform Prof. Churchill of the investigation, publicly announces that although all of Prof. Churchill's writings and speeches are protected by the First Amendment, the University has received other allegations which require investigation. Subsequently it comes out that all of the allegations actually investigated were either created or solicited by University administrators.

Spring 2005: The University feeds the media frenzy, holding press conferences to announce each step of the "investigation" in direct violation of confidentiality rules. In turn, news coverage is submitted for investigation by Interim Chancellor DiStefano as "complainant."

Fall 2005: An Investigative Committee is appointed, chaired by CU law professor Mimi Wesson. Prof. Churchill is not informed that Prof. Wesson had circulated a memo in Feb. 2005 comparing Prof. Churchill to "charismatic male celebrity wrongdoers" like OJ Simpson, Bill Clinton, and Michael Jackson. The Committee includes no American Indians and no one specializing in American Indian or Indigenous Studies.

May 9, 2006: The Investigative Committee holds a press conference to release its Report, claiming to have found 7 instances of research misconduct. One committee member recommends termination, four recommend suspension.

June 16, 2006: Interim Chancellor DiStefano, the "complainant," now becomes sentencing judge, recommending dismissal.

May 3, 2007: An internal faculty appeal panel finds the University has not met its burden of proof on some charges, but upholds others (documentation of the 1837 smallpox epidemic and questions of author attribution). Two members of the panel support dismissal; three recommend a 1-year suspension.

Prof. Churchill requests that CU President Hank Brown recuse himself from the dismissal process, based upon Brown's biases, including his close ties to ACTA, which has consistently denounced Prof. Churchill (see ACTA's How Many Ward Churchills?).

May 10 and 28, 2007: Two groups of professors and attorneys file research misconduct charges against the Investigative Committee for falsifying and fabricating evidence against Prof. Churchill in their Report . The governing board of the Colorado Conference of AAUP chapters calls on the University not to take action against Prof. Churchill until the legitimacy and objectivity of the Report has been investigated.

June 7, 2007: CU President Hank Brown refuses to recuse himself or delay action, and overrides the majority of both the Investigative Committee and the faculty appeal panel to recommend that the Regents fire Prof. Churchill.

July/Aug 2007: The CU Regents will vote on dismissing Prof. Churchill.

Quick links :

Two sets of research misconduct charges filed against CU Investigative Committee:

http://wardchurchill.net/files/misconduct_charges_letter_and_supporting_docs.doc

http://wardchurchill.net/files/rm_indig_sch_052807.pdf

Debunking plagiarism charges: http://wardchurchill.net/files/mayer_on_plagiarism_charges_0607.pdf

The ACTA connection: http://wardchurchill.net/files/cu_acta_ad.pdf

Indigenous Studies: http://wardchurchill.net/files/indig_conf_resol_020307.pdf

NY Review of Books Open Letter: http://wardchurchill.net/files/open_letter_for_nyrb.pdf

Teachers for a Democratic Society petition: http://www.teachersfordemocracy.org/?q=node/19

Eskiminzin (1828-1895)

2007-04-30T08:52:00.000-07:00

April 28, 1871: Either convinced that Eskiminzin's Apache are responsible for raids near Tucson, or just looking for an excuse to attack the Aravaipas, William Oury sets out with 140 armed whites and Indians for the Apache camp near Camp Grant.

April 30 1871: William Oury, a veteran Indian fighter from Tucson, and 140 men, including 92 Papago Indians, find the unarmed camp of Eskiminzin's Aravaipa Apaches living near Camp Grant. Believing them to be raiders of San Xavier Mission on April 10th, over 50 miles away near Tucson, the group attacks the unsuspecting village. 144 Indians will be killed during the massacre. Twenty-seven children will survive, they will all be sold into slavery in Mexico by the Papagos. Lt. Royal Whitman, of Camp Grant hears of the expedition against the Indians, but his message of warning, will arrive a few hours after the fighting begins. Lt. Whitman, believing the Aravaipas to be innocent, eventually gets the Tucson men brought to trial in Tucson. Many Army members testify that the Aravaipas could not possibly have been involved in the raids, but after the five-day trail, and a deliberation of lest than half an hour, the Tucson men are acquitted.

From http://www.desertusa.com/mag98/april/stories/campgrant1.html

Arizona's Camp Grant Massacre
by Howard Sheldon

In the pre-dawn hours of April 30, 1871, eight men and 110 women and children were brutally murdered in the brief span of 30 minutes. In addition, 28 Arivaipa Apache papoose were kidnapped from the grisly scene for sale in the child slave trade. The corpses left to rot in the morning sun of Arivaipa Canyon were a macabre sight to Dr. Conant B. Briesly the first white man to chronicle the sight when he arrived at half past seven the same morning. By eight o'clock that morning, the mongrel band responsible for the gruesome massacre was breakfasting and celebrating their victory over an Indian tribe of defenseless, sleeping victims. What prompted 148 Arizonans -- comprised of 6 Anglos, 94 San Xavier Papagos and 48 Mexicans -- to commit such an atrocity?

April 30, 1998, marks the 127th anniversary of this dark page in Arizona's Territorial diary, written in Arivaipa Apache blood. There will be no recognition of this day by the white man. There is no physical marker to locate the site. However, this day has not been forgotten by the relatives of those slain, the Arivaipa Apaches. This attempt at genocide is known as the Camp Grant Massacre.

The events that led up to and culminated in the Camp Grant Massacre were the severe depredations of humans and livestock in the first four months of 1871. Atrocities were committed by both the white man and the native Indians. The immigrants, white-eyed enemies or pindah-lickoyee as the Indians called them, were moving in by the thousands and exhausting the native food and water resources. The Arivaipa Apaches relied on game and native plants -- primarily mescal -- as their primary food sources. With these problems and a host of others, which included new diseases introduced by the white man, it is easier to understand why the native peoples were unwilling to share their home with these new uninvited guests. Much to the chagrin of the settlers, government representatives were unavailable to protect the white citizenry. Unable to see any relief in sight, six white pioneers, a mixed company of San Xavier Papagos and Mexican's, took matters into their own hands, vigilante style.

Introducing The Key Players

William S. Oury, organizer of the raid on Camp Grant's Apache Indians, was a hot-tempered Virginian who fought in the Texas War for independence. He was a soldier in the US/Mexican War and served at the Alamo. Known for his violent temper, he killed two men in separate duels in Tucson.

Eskiminzin was then Chief of the Arivaipa Indians. His name means "Men Stand in Line for Him". In February of 1871, Eskiminzin was tired of the warpath. He sent five old Apache women to inquire at Camp Grant about peace and protection. Lt. Whitman received the women courteously and worked out an appointed time for a peace talk with their leader. On subsequent meetings, it was arranged for the Indians to stay in wickiups east of Camp Grant. In exchange for the protection and food, the Indians were employed in farming, gathering hay and working for nearby ranches. This worked out well for both the Apaches and the U.S. military. Eskiminzin had a reputation that caused much fear among the whites. An account states that about a month after the Camp Grant incident, Eskiminizin wanted to show his fellow Arivaipas that there could be no friendship with the white man. Eskiminzin had a close white friend of many years, a rancher named Charles McKinney. Eskiminzin shared an evening meal with McKinney, and at the conclusion of the meal, the two smoked a cigarette together. Upon finishing, Eskiminzin stood up, pulled a revolver from his pants and shot the man at point-blank range, killing him. When Eskiminzin was later asked about the incident, he was quoted as saying, "Any coward can kill his enemy, but it takes a brave man to kill his friend."

Events leading up to the massacre

March 10, 1871. A baggage train was attacked by Indians. Two men were brutally murdered and 16 mules were stolen.

March 20, 1871. Tubac rancher L.B. Wooster was attacked and killed. A Mexican woman was kidnapped from a town south of Tucson.

March 22, 1871. A meeting of angry Tucson residents assembled and a Committee on Public Safety was formed. One item on the agenda was to send a delegation to General Stoneman to request military protection. General Stoneman reiterated the government's policy on pacification and objected to the request, calling it criticism. Oury then concluded that the residents were on their own. Lt. Royal Whitman assured Tucson's residents that the Apaches under his control never left the Camp Grant compound.

March 25, 1871. An editorial in Tucson's Arizona Citizen fanned the flames of Indian hatred by asking, "Will the Department Commander any longer permit the murderers to be fed by the supplies purchased with the people's money?" April 10, 1871. Indians plundered a farm and carried off 19 head of cattle. News of this reached Tucson via the Papagos, and a posse was dispatched which gave chase for 50 miles. It caught up with a straggling Indian, killed him and identified him as an Arivaipa Apache from Camp Grant. During the chase, three more white settlers were killed. The incident was reported in Arizona Citizen. Three days later, in a community 30 miles from Camp Grant, a farmer was murdered.

Arizona Citizen Editor John Wasson had obtained General Stoneman's 1870 annual report. The report recommended that seven of 15 military posts be closed. The report also bragged about Stoneman's "much to be praised" new roads and construction projects.

April 28, 1871. Anglos and Mexicans left Tucson a few at a time -- to avoid suspicion -- and headed towards Camp Grant, where they were positive the problem existed.

April 30, 1871. After two days of traveling only at night, the vigilantes arrived at Camp Grant under the cover of darkness while the Arivaipa Indians slept. The mongrel band of Papagos, with clubs and lances in hand, and Mexicans and Anglos armed to the teeth with rifles and six-shooters, stealthily approached the sleeping, defenseless people. In a brief 30 minutes they laid to waste every man, woman and child. Upon leaving, they took 28 children as captives.

April 30, 1871, 7:30 a.m. That morning, a harried messenger arrived at Camp Grant from Fort Lowell interrupting Lt. Whitman's breakfast with an urgent message. It stated that armed citizenry from Tucson were planning a massacre of the Lieutenant's prisoners of war, the Apaches. The Lieutenant immediately dispatched two interpreters to warn the Indians and have them come to the post directly for protection.

But by the time the interpreters arrived, the camp was completely decimated. Post surgeon, Conant B. Briesly, along with 12 men, were immediately dispatched to render aid to the injured. However, the massacre was so thorough, only one woman survived. She was so emotionally paralyzed that she would not come back to the post.

*****

>From http://www.geocities.com/~zybt/warriors.htm

ESKIMINZIN

.... one of the most misunderstood and maligned (Apache leaders) was the great leader of the Aravaipa Apaches, Eskiminzin.

Eskiminzin was born about 1828, probably near the Pinal Mountains. He was actually a Pinal Apache, but married into the Aravaipas (south of the Pinals). His father-in-law was Santos, chief of the Aravaipas. Eskiminzin was nearly always in very difficult positions trying to save his people. When he felt they had to fight to survive, he was unafraid to do so. When it was better for his people to accept peace terms, he did so. He always had the welfare of his people in mind. It was Eskiminzin who finally negotiated the terms by which the great San Carlos Apache Reservation was established. (See my page on the Apache Wars). However, after the reservation was established he experienced real tragedy.

In the summer of 1873 conditions on the reservation reached crisis proportions. Eskiminzin felt it was best that he should flee. Consequently, he was later captured and put in chains. When John Clum arrived, he ordered him released, because Clum felt he had been treated shamefully. Eskiminzin even visited Washington, D.C., with Clum in 1876. Slowly, Eskiminzin began to feel that peace was beginning to pay off.

However, in 1887 his son-in-law, the Apache Kid, was arrested for the murder of a rival on the San Carlos Reservation. When the Kid finally escaped, it was believed that Eskiminzin would aid him from time to time. Therefore, Eskiminzin was arrested in April or May 1891 and sent to Ft. Wingate, New Mexico, with 40 other supposed sympathizers with the Kid. They were forced to join the Chiricahuas who were then at Mt. Vernon, Alabama (before their removal to Oklahoma). Eskiminzin and his San Carlos braves were not exactly on friendly terms with the Chiricahuas, and they found their situation to be very difficult.

Finally, a white friend, Hugh Lennox Scott, convinced authorities that Eskiminzin should be released. He arrived back in San Carlos on 23 November 1894. A year later Eskiminzin died. His life had been truly tragic in the extreme.

There are still many descendants of Eskiminzin on the San Carlos Reservation. His legacy is revered, but the hurt of what happened to this man is still deeply felt.

----------------------

For more information on Eskiminzin, read: Browning, Sinclair. Enju. Introduction by Morris K. Udall. Flagstaff: Northland Press, 1982. Schellie, Don. Vast Domain of Blood. Los Angeles: Westernlore Press, 1968. An important article is: Marion, Jeannie. "As Long as the Stone Lasts: General O. O. Howard's 1872 Conference." Journal of Arizona History 35 (Summer 1994): 109-140. (Marion is supposed to have a book forthcoming on Eskiminzin.)

See also NAW posting for Eskiminzin at:
NAW: Eskiminzin

Ottawa Chief Pontiac (1720-1769)

2007-04-27T07:57:00.000-07:00

April 27, 1763: Today, Pontiac will hold a council with a large group of Ottawa, Wyandot and Potawotami indians. He will tell them of his plans to attack Fort Detroit. He will extol the virtues of returning to the old Indian ways, before the coming of the Europeans.

( Image courtesy of www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com )

( The following is from http://www.chiefpontiac.org/ )

Ottawa Chief Pontiac (1720 - 1769)

PONTIAC, chief of the Ottawas, born on Ottawa river about 1720; died in Cahokia, Ill., in 1769. He was the son of an Ojibway woman, and, as the Ottawas were in alliance with the Ojibways and Potawotamies, he became the principal chief of the three tribes.

In 1746, with his warriors, he defended the French at Detroit against an attack by some of the northern tribes, and in 1755 he is believed to have led the Ottawas at Braddock's defeat. After the surrender of Quebec, Major Robert Rogers, of New Hampshire, was sent to take possession of the western forts, under the treaty of Paris, but in November, 1760, while encamped at the place where the city of Cleveland now stands, he was visited by Pontiac, who objected to his further invasion of the territory. Finding, however, that the French had been driven from Canada, he acquiesced in the surrender of Detroit, and persuaded 400 Detroit Indians, who were lying in ambush, to relinquish their design of cutting off the English. While this action was doubtless in good faith, still he hated the English and soon began to plan their extermination.

In 1762 he sent messengers with a red stained tomahawk and a wampum war belt, who visited every tribe between the Ottawa and the lower Mississippi, all of whom joined in the conspiracy The end of May was determined upon as the time when each tribe was to dispose of the garrison of the nearest fort, and then all were to attack the settlements. A great council was held near Detroit on 27 April, 1763, when Pontiac delivered an oration, in which the wrongs and indignities that the Indians had suffered at the hands of the English were recounted, and their own extermination was prophesied. He also told them of a tradition, which he could hardly have invented, that a Delaware Indian had been admitted into the presence of the Great Spirit, who told him his race must return to the customs and weapons of their ancestors, throw away the implements they had acquired from the white man, abstain from whiskey, and take up the hatchet against the English, "these dogs dressed in red, who have come to rob you of your hunting grounds and drive away the game."

The taking of Detroit was to be his special task, and the 7th of May was appointed for the attack ; but the plot was disclosed to the commander of the post by an Indian girl, and in consequence Pontiac found the garrison prepared. Foiled in his original intention, on 12 May he surrounded Detroit with his Indians; but he was unable to keep a close siege, and the garrison received food from the Canadian settlers. The latter likewise supplied the Indians, in return for which they received promissory notes drawn on birch bark and signed with the figure of an otter, all of which it is said were subsequently redeemed. Supplies and reinforcements were sent to Detroit by way of Lake Erie, in schooners ; but these were captured by the Indians, who compelled the prisoners to row them to Detroit in hope of taking the garrison by stratagem, but the Indians, concealed in the bottom of the boat, were discovered before a landing could be effected. Subsequently another schooner, filled with supplies and ammunition, succeeded in reaching the fort, and this vessel the Indians repeatedly tried to destroy by means of fire rafts.

The English now believed themselves sufficiently strong to make an attack upon the Indian camp, and 250 men, on the night of 31 July, set out for that purpose; but Pontiac had been advised of this intention by the Canadians, and, waiting until the English had advanced sufficiently, opened fire on them from all sides. In this fight, which is known as that of Bloody Bridge, 59 of the English were killed or wounded. A desultory warfare continued until 12 Oct., when the siege was raised and Pontiac retired into the country that borders Maumee river, where he vainly endeavored to organize another movement. Although Pontiac failed in the most important action of the conspiracy, still Fort Sandusky, Fort St. Joseph, Fort Miami, Fort Ouatanon, Mackinaw, Presque Isle, Fort Le Bceuf, and Fort Venango were taken and their garrisons were massacred, while unsuccessful attacks were made elsewhere. The English soon sent troops against the Indians, and succeeded in pacifying most of the tribes, so that, during the summer of 1766, a meeting of Indian chiefs, including Pontiac, was held in Oswego, where a treaty was concluded with Sir William Johnson. Although Pontiac's conspiracy failed in its grand object, still it had resulted in the capture and destruction of eight out of the twelve fortified posts that were attacked, generally by the massacre of their garrisons, it had destroyed several costly English expeditions, and had carried terror and desolation into some of the most fertile valleys on the frontiers of civilization. In 1769 a Kaskaskia Indian, being bribed with a barrel of liquor and promise of additional reward, followed Pontiac into the forest and there murdered him.

----------------

See Francis Parkman's "History of the Conspiracy of Pontiac and the War of the North American Tribes against the English Colonies after the Conquest of Canada" (Boston, 1851), also Franklin B. Hough's "Diary of the Siege of Detroit in the War with Pontiac" (Albany, 1860). -- Edited Appleton's Cyclopedia American Biography

*****

( The following is From http://members.aol.com/wicaho/two.htm )

"You Must Lift the Hatchet Against Them"

A Delaware Indian conceived an eager desire to learn wisdom from the Master of Life; but, being ignorant where to find him, he had recourse to fasting, dreaming, and magical incantations. By these means, it was revealed to him, that, by moving forward in a straight, undeviating course, he would reach the abode of the Great Spirit. He told his purpose to no one, and having provided the equipment's of a bunter-gun, powder horn, ammunition, and a kettle for preparing his food-he set out on his errand. For some time, he journeyed on in high hope and confidence. On the evening of the eighth day, he stopped by the side of a brook at the edge of a meadow, where he began to make ready his evening meal, when, looking up, he saw three large openings in the woods before him, and three well-beaten paths which entered them. He was much surprised; but his wonder increased, when, after it had grown dark, the three paths were more clearly visible than ever. Remembering the important object of his journey, he could neither rest nor sleep; and, leaving his fire, he crossed the meadow, and entered the largest of the three openings. He had advanced but a short distance into the forest, when a bright flame sprang out of the ground before him, and arrested his steps. In great amazement, he turned back, and entered the second path, where the same wonderful phenomenon again encountered him; and now, in terror and bewilderment, yet still resolved to persevere, he took the last of the three paths. On this he journeyed a whole day without interruption, when at length, emerging from the forest, he saw before him a vast mountain, of dazzling whiteness. So precipitous was the ascent that the Indian thought it hopeless to go farther, and looked around him in despair; at that moment, he saw, seated at some distance above, the figure of a beautiful woman arrayed in white, who arose as he looked upon her, and thus accosted him:

"How can you hope, encumbered as you are, to succeed in your design? Go down to the foot of the mountain, throw away your gun, your ammunition, your provisions, and your clothing; wash yourself in the stream which flows there, and you will then be prepared to stand before the Master of Life."

The Indian obeyed, and again began to ascend among the rocks, while the woman, seeing him still discouraged, laughed at his faintness of heart, and told him that, if he wished for success, he must climb by the aid of one hand and one foot only. After great toil and suffering, he at length found himself at the summit. The woman had disappeared, and he was left alone. A rich and beautiful plain lay before him, and at a little distance, he saw three great villages, far superior to the squalid wigwams of the Delaware's. As he approached the largest, and stood hesitating whether he should enter, a man gorgeously attired stepped forth, and, taking him by the hand, welcomed him to the celestial abode. He then conducted him into the presence of the Great Spirit, where the Indian stood confounded at the unspeakable splendor which surrounded him. The Great Spirit bade him be seated, and thus addressed him:

"I am the Maker of heaven and earth, the trees, lakes, rivers, and all things else. I am the Maker of mankind; and because I love you, you must do my will. The land on which you live I have made for you, and not for others. Why do you suffer the white men to dwell among you? My children, you have forgotten the customs and traditions of your forefathers. Why do you not clothe yourselves in skins, as they did, and use the bows and arrows, and the stone-pointed lances, which they used? You have bought guns, knives, kettles, and blankets, from the white men, until you can no longer do without them; and, what is worse, you have drunk the poison firewater, which turns you into fools. Fling all these things away; live as your wise forefathers lived before you. And as for these English-these dogs dressed in red, who have come to rob you of your hunting grounds, and drive away the game-you must lift the hatchet against them. Wipe them from the face of the earth, and then you will win my favor back again, and once more be happy and prosperous. The children of your great father, the King of France, are not like the English. Never forget that they are your brethren. They are very dear to me, for they love the red men, and understand the true mode of worshipping me."

Pipestone National Monument

2007-04-19T11:44:00.000-07:00

April 19, 1858: The Yankton Sioux sign a treaty today. Article 8 provides for the Indians to retain access and use of the red pipestone quarry in southwestern Minnesota.

(Catlin image courtesy of NPS)

An account of the origin of the pipestone, as recorded by George Catlin, 1836:

At an ancient time the Great Spirit, in the form of a large bird, stood upon the wall of rock and called all the tribes around him, and breaking out a piece of the red stone formed it into a pipe and smoked it, the smoke rolling over the whole multitude. He then told his red children that this red stone was their flesh, that they were made from it, that they must all smoke to him through it, that they must use it for nothing but pipes: and as it belonged alike to all tribes, the ground was sacred, and no weapons must be used or brought upon it.

(Image courtesy of www.traveleze.com)

(The following is from www.pipestoneminnesota.com/museum/history2.htm)

According to geologists, pipestone was formed when a stream system deposited layer upon layer of sand and other sediment. The sand was eventually compressed into sandstone, and the red clay under it into clay stone. Some sediment was removed by one of the four glaciers which traveled through the area and scraped the land down to the sandstone. Under the weight of the glaciers and with extremely high temperatures, the sandstone became quartzite and the red clay sediment turned into pipestone.

The vein of pipestone is sandwiched between two layers of hard quartzite, four to twelve feet below the earth's surface.

Outcroppings of pipestone are also found in Montana, Arizona, Kansas, South Dakota, Wisconsin and Ohio. Pieces of pipestone from Minnesota's quarry have been found in burial mounds in many different sections of North America, leading historians to believe that various tribes journeyed thousands of miles to quarry here. During the summer, tribal bands would divide into groups, each with its own task to complete. While some parties hunted buffalo, others would travel to the quarry to get pipestone.

.... Philander Prescott, who worked for the North American Fur Company, was probably the first white man to see the quarry and document his visit. In 1831 he wrote, "Indians have labored here very hard with hoes and axes, the only tools except large stones...we found a six pound cannon ball that the Indians have brought there from the Missouri to break the rock."

Joseph Nicollet, a French scientist on a U.S. government-sponsored exhibition to map the upper Mississippi area, explored the quarry in 1838. Nicollet and his party left their initials on the northern end of the quartzite ledge, where they are still visible today.

... In an effort to gain control of more territory, the U.S. government, through the general Indian Appropriations bill of 1851, negotiated a treaty for the title to all of their Minnesota lands, which was most of southern Minnesota. The Sisseton and Wahpeton bands ceded their lands, including the pipestone quarry, in a treaty signed at Traverse des Sioux in 1851. However, the Yankton tribe was not part of the treaty and objected to losing the quarry. They tried to gain compensation by demanding a part of the revenue given to the Sisseton and Wahpetons, but were unsuccessful.

Seven years later, the Yanktons ceded eleven million acres of their land and were guaranteed "free and unrestricted use of the red pipestone quarry...to visit and procure stone for pipes so long as they shall desire." A 650-acre reservation was created around the quarry.

This by no means settled the conflict between the Native Americans and white people. With the coming of settlers Pipestone City was planned, and by 1881 a large quartzite building-stone quarry was opened by a white settler. Two years later white pioneers including the mayor, C.C. Goodnow, settled on the reservation, filed claims and began to build homes. They refused to leave until four years later when a corps of ten enlisted men sent from South Dakota ordered the settlers to move.

An act of Congress provided for the establishment of Indian Industrial Training Schools in Minnesota, Michigan and Wisconsin. The government took possession of the Pipestone reservation when the school was established there in1892. Some tribal members wanted compensation for land, others wanted to retain the quarry altogether. A vote was taken of the male tribal members and by a narrow majority title to the reservation was ceded for $100,000; the government agreed to preserve the quarry as a national park. But this bill was never ratified by Congress.

Over the next few decades, the Yanktons fought to retrieve the money for their land through the U.S. Court system. Finally the Supreme Court ruled that the government was liable to compensate the Yanktons when it took possession of the entire reservation for the training school.

A total of $328,558 in principle plus interest was awarded in 1929. With the payment of this judgement title to the land passed to the United States, and all treaty rights of the Yanktons were at an end. Pipestone National Monument was signed into legislation in 1937.

Today, only Native Americans are allowed to quarry pipestone. It may take up to three to six weeks to complete the quarrying process, which usually occurs from late may to late October. Only hand tools, such as sledge hammers, chisels, wedges and shovels can be used.

The quarrier sets a wedge into visible cracks in the quartzite and drives it in with a sledge hammer. Large chunks of quartzite loosened and pried away from the quartzite wall until the pipestone layer is exposed. Although the layer of pipestone may be fourteen to eighteen inches thick, only two inches of it are suitable for carving pipes.

(Map courtesy of www.uwsp.edu)

Isimanica, Comanche

2007-03-28T09:45:00.000-07:00

March 28, 1840: After hearing of the fight in San Antonio on March 19, 1840, the remaining Comanches are outraged. Today, Chief Isimanica, and 300 Comanches ride up to San Antonio. Isimanica, and one warrior, ride into the central square and challenge anyone to a fight. The civilians decline, but tell him that the Army is at the San Jose Mission.

BACKGROUND:

From http://jack0204.tripod.com/gen/Heskew/council.htm

On March 28, Chief Isimanica (Hears the Wolf, Howard calls him Isamini) and about 300 Comanches appeared at the edge of San Antonio. Accompanied by one brave, Chief Isimanica, almost naked and painted for war, rode into the square, circled it, and rode down and back up Commerce Street, shouting insults and challenging any one to fight. At Black's Saloon, he stopped, stood in the stirrups, and shouted his defiance. An interpreter told him that the soldiers were at San Jose Mission, to go there and find Colonel Fisher if he wanted a fight.

Chief Isimanica and his Comanches then went to San Jose There they challenged Colonel Fisher, sick in bed, and Captain Read, next in command, to a fight. The captain explained that a twelve-day truce had been made to exchange prisoners and would not be broken. If the Comanches wished to remain three days, when the truce was over, they would furnish them a fight. The chief voiced his insults and then left. The soldiers could hardly be restrained and some were ordered into the mission church to keep them from starting a fight with the Comanches.

Hearing of this, Captain Lysander Wells called Captain Read a coward. The result was a duel in which both men were shot and killed. Read died immediately and Wells, in great pain, died after some days.

*****

>From http://www.sanjacinto-museum.org/kemp/v677.html

On March 28th between two hundred and fifty and three hundred Comanches under a dashing young chief, Isimanica, cane close to the edge of the town where the main body halted and Chief Isimanica with another warrior rode daringly into the public square and circled around it, then rode some distance down Commerce Street and back, shouting all the while, offering fight and heaping abuse and insults upon the Americans. Isimanica was in full war paint, and almost naked. He stopped longest in Black's saloon, at the north east corner of the square; he shouted defiance, he rose in his stirrups, shook his clenched fist, raved and foamed at the mouth. The citizens, through an interpreter, told him the soldiers were all down the river at Mission San Jose and if he went there Colonel (William S.) Fisher wood give him fight enough.

Isimanica took his braves to San Jose and with fearless daring bantered the soldiers for a fight. colonel Fisher was lying on a sick bed and Captain Redd, the next in rank, was in command. He said to the chief: "We have made a twelve day truce with your people in order to exchange prisoners. My country's honor is pledged, as well as my own, to keep the truce, and I will not break it. Remain here three days or return in three days and the truce will be over. We burn to fight you." Isimanica called him liar, coward and other opprobrious names, and hung around for sometime, but at last the Indians left and did not return. Captain Redd remained. calm and unmoved, but his men could with the greatest difficulty be restrained and in fact some of them were ordered into the Mission church and the door guarded.

hist0328b

Cherokee Chief Tahchee (Tatsi)

2007-03-12T08:23:00.000-07:00

Throughout his life, Cherokee Chief Tahchee, also known as Captain William Dutch, was known as a fearless warrior. Tahchee was one of the original groups of Cherokees to move west of the Mississippi river. He became a major political force in the "old settler party". He fought many fights with the Osage Indians who leaved near the Cherokees. Eventually, he would become a scout for the U.S. Army, where he reached the rank of Captain. Tahchee died on March 12, 1848, in Indian Territory.

(image courtesy of www.philaprintshop.com)

BACKGROUND: From http://space.tin.it/io/vminerva/dutch.htm

The life story of this Cherokee chief (Tatsi is probably the correct spelling) is typical of an Indian who was born shortly after the Revolution and lived in the first part of the nineteenth century. His days were occupied with war, raids, horse stealing, scouting and hunting.

Dutch, as he is known to frontier history, was a child when his family joined the first Cherokee removal from the big Indian village called Turkey Town on the Coosa River in what is now Alabama to the St.Francis River in Arkansas, west of the Mississippi. It was a wild country that had not known the white man's presence.

The casual life of the hunter appealed to him, and at about the age of twelve he joined one of those incredible Indian hunting parties that roamed the prairies for as long as three years.

It was a life of feast or famine. The hunter's constant enemy was the weather. Weary hours were spent on horseback, but the hardships were forgotten in the excitement of the hunt and the occasional clash with other tribes.

Dutch roamed beyond the Mississippi and explored the Red River country. Years later a white man asked him how many buffalo he had killed and Dutch answered, "So many I cannot number them."

He lived with other tribes to study the techniques of their hunters, even the Osage, the traditional foe of the Cherokee, and was among the few of his nation who knew the Osage dialect. He became a legend on the plains and the prairies, a lone hunter with three large dogs running on both sides of his horse's flanks. He explored the Arkansas River to the south of the Grand, or Neosho, River, then traveled on foot for hundreds of miles to the Missouri. When he returned downriver his canoe was almost swamped by beaver skins.

The treaty the Cherokee made with the United States in 1828 so infuriated Dutch that he led several families to the Red River country. They were constantly at war with those superbs horsemen of the Texas plains, the Comanche. To keep the frontier peaceful, the army ordered both nations to stop their raids, an order Dutch refused to recognize. He was finally declared an outlaw, and the army's wanted poster offered five hundred dollars for him dead or alive.

Dutch fought a one-man war with the army for years, even boldly scalping a Comanche [an Osage, according to other sources] in the shadow of Fort Gibson. Both sides finally grew weary of the hound and hare game. The commander, a shrewd man, hired Dutch to form a group of Indian scouts in the army's campaign against the Comanche. Before he retired to his ranch on the Canadian River, Dutch was known throughout the early Indian fighting army as a tireless tracker and "a man to be relied on".

Catlin who met Dutch in 1834 called him "a guide and hunter for the regiment of dragoons.... The history of this man's life has been very curious and surprising; and I sincerely hope that someone, with more leisure and more talent than myself, will take it up, and do it justice. I promise that the life of this man furnishes the best materials for a popular tale, that are now to be procured on the Western frontier."

Oldest Solar Observatory in Americas

2007-03-02T09:23:00.000-08:00

NPR has a report on the oldest solar observatory known in the Americas, at Chankillo, Peru. It's dated 2,000 years before the Incas:

Archeologists may have uncovered what they say is by far the oldest astronomical observatory in the Americas: a series of towers near a temple in coastal Peru, built in the fourth century B.C.

The towers at Chankillo mark the sun's progress across the sky, according to a new study in Science. This suggests the sun may have played an important role in religious and political life long before the appearance of the famous Inca sun cult.

Mysterious Towers

In the 19th century, explorers in the area observed the 13 stubby towers dotting a long ridge close to an ancient fortress. The explorers suggested that the towers had to do with the movement of the moon, and left it at that.

A few years ago, Ivan Ghezzi at long last drummed up enough funding to excavate the Chankillo site, and uncover its secrets.

Ghezzi is at the Catholic University of Peru and the national director of archeology. He quickly realized the towers had nothing to do with the moon, but everything to do with the sun. The key was viewing the sky from either of two structures that stood nearby.

"You could actually watch the sunrise align with the northernmost tower during the June solstice," he says. "And with the opposite tower... you could see the sunrise at the December solstice. So we realized that here we had an astronomical device that was designed to keep track of the movement of the sun and therefore keep track of time."

Built 2,300 years ago, the towers are by far the earliest example of an observatory in the Americas.

Sun Worshipers

Ghezzi knows frustratingly little about the people who built the towers and the fortifications at Chankillo.

It is unclear whether they were in any way forerunners of the Incas, the famous sun worshipers who appeared on the scene many centuries after these structures were built.

"We know that the Incas made powerful political statements based on the relationship between the sun and the king," Ghezzi says. "The Inca claimed to be the offspring of the sun. But now we have a society that is 1,800 years before the Inca that is clearly using the sun as a way to make a political, social and ideological statement."

It is clear that the towers were more than just a fancy sundial. For one thing, the fortifications nearby appear to protect a temple.

Anthony Aveni, an archeoastronomer at Colgate University, agrees with Ghezzi's interpretation that the site is of great cultural, religious and political significance, in addition to its practical use for timing plantings and harvests.

The priests who controlled the temple would have used their knowledge of astronomy as part of their mystique and power.

Ancient Astronomy

The question, as always in a situation like this, is whether the towers were really built with an astronomical purpose, or if the layout turns out to be a happy coincidence. Aveni, for one, is convinced this observatory was designed to track solar events.

"It does work, and it works in a way that makes sense given what we know about Andean calendars," he says.

The towers also help mark other solar events and count out a 10-day week used by Andean cultures.

Ivan Gehzzi is working to turn the well-preserved ruins of Chankillo into a major tourist destination.

Oldest Solar Observatory in Americas

"Apocalypto"

2007-03-01T10:22:00.000-08:00

If you did not get to see it in the movie theatres, I recommend you experience "Apocalypto" when it comes out on DVD.

Here is one of the first reviews written about the movie:

The Passion of the Maya

By A. O. SCOTT
Published: December 8, 2006, NEW YORK TIMES

“I’m going to peel off his skin and make him watch me wear it.” This grisly threat is delivered by one of the main bad guys in Mel Gibson’s “Apocalypto.” The promised flaying never takes place, but viewers who share this director’s apparently limitless appetite for gore will not be disappointed, since not much else in the way of bodily torment has been left to the imagination. There are plenty of disembowelings, impalings, clubbings and beheadings. Hearts are torn, still beating, from slashed-open chests. A man’s face is chewed off by a jaguar. Another’s neck is pierced by darts tipped with frog venom. Most disturbing, perhaps, is the sight of hundreds of corpses haphazardly layered in an open pit: a provocative and ill-advised excursion into Holocaust imagery on this director’s part.

Violence has become the central axiom in Mr. Gibson’s practice as a filmmaker, his major theme and also his chief aesthetic interest. The brutality in “Apocalypto” is so relentless and extreme that it sometimes moves beyond horror into a kind of grotesque comedy, but to dismiss it as excessive or gratuitous would be to underestimate Mr. Gibson’s seriousness. And say what you will about him — about his problem with booze or his problem with Jews — he is a serious filmmaker.

Which is not to say that “Apocalypto” is a great film, or even that it can be taken quite as seriously as it wants to be. Mr. Gibson’s technical command has never been surer; for most of its 2-hour 18-minute running time, “Apocalypto,” written by Mr. Gibson and Farhad Safinia, is a model of narrative economy, moving nimbly forward and telling its tale with clarity and force. It is, above all, a muscular and kinetic action movie, a drama of rescue and revenge with very little organic relation to its historical setting. Yes, the dialogue is in various Mayan dialects, which will sound at least as strange to American ears as the Latin and Aramaic of “The Passion of the Christ,” but the film’s real language is Hollywood’s, and Mr. Gibson’s, native tongue.

When I first heard about this project, and later when I saw the early trailers, I halfway hoped that Mr. Gibson might turn out to be an American (or half-Australian) version of Werner Herzog, setting out into the jungle to explore the dark and tangled regions of human nature. Once you get past the costumes and the subtitles, though, the most striking thing about “Apocalypto” is how comfortably it sits within the conventions of mainstream moviemaking. It is not an obsessive opera like Mr. Herzog’s “Aguirre: The Wrath of God,” but rather a pop period epic in the manner of “Gladiator” or “Braveheart,” and as such less interested in historical or cultural authenticity than in imposing an accessible scheme on a faraway time and place.

The setting is Central America before the arrival of the Spanish, when the Maya empire, in Mr. Gibson’s version, was already in the process of collapsing from within. The basic moral conflict — as it was in “Braveheart,” directed by and starring Mr. Gibson, and in “The Patriot,” a vehicle for him directed by Roland Emmerich — is between a small group of people trying to live simple, decent, traditional lives and a larger, more powerful political entity driven by bloodlust and greed. This kind of conservative anti-imperialism runs consistently through Mr. Gibson’s work; whether the empire in question is Roman, British or Mesoamerican, and whatever its political resonance might be, it allows the viewer to root for an unambiguously virtuous underdog.

“Apocalypto” begins with a group of young men out on a hunt and lingers for a while in their happy, earthy village, a place that might double as a nostalgic vision of small-town America were it not for the loin cloths, the tattooed buttocks and the facial piercings. Blunted (Jonathan Brewer) is nagged by his mother-in-law and teased by his buddies because he hasn’t yet made his wife pregnant, but he accepts his humiliation in good humor, like the jolly fat kid on a family sitcom.

Meanwhile Jaguar Paw (Rudy Youngblood), whose father (Morris Birdyellowhead) is an admired hunter and warrior, snuggles down with his pregnant wife, Seven (Dalia Hernandez), and their young son, Turtle Run (Carlos Emilio Baez). There’s fresh tapir meat on the grill and an old-timer telling stories by the fire. Life is good.

Needless to say, this pastoral idyll cannot last. The ominous strains of James Horner’s score indicate as much. Before long the village is set upon by fearsome marauders, led by Zero Wolf (Raoul Trujillo), who rape, burn and kill with ruthless discipline and undisguised glee. The locals resist valiantly, but the survivors are led away to an uncertain fate. Seven and Turtle Run stay behind, hidden in a hole in the ground.

Jaguar Paw’s mission will be to rescue them and also to avenge his friends and kin. First, though, he will accompany us on a Cecil B. DeMille tour of the decadent imperial capital, a place of misery, luxury and corruption, where priests and nobles try to keep famine and pestilence at bay with round-the-clock human sacrifices.

Neither Mr. Gibson’s fans nor his detractors are likely to accuse him of excessive subtlety, and the effectiveness of “Apocalypto” is inseparable from its crudity. But the blunt characterizations and the emphatic emotional cues are also evidence of the director’s skill.

Perhaps because he is aiming for an audience wary of subtitles, Mr. Gibson rarely uses dialogue as a means of exposition, and he proves himself to be an able, if not always terribly original, visual storyteller. He is not afraid of clichés — the slow-motion, head-on sprint toward the camera; the leap from the waterfall into the river below — but he executes them with a showman’s maniacal relish.

And it is, all in all, a pretty good show. There is a tendency, at least among journalists, to take Mr. Gibson as either a monster or a genius, a false choice that he frequently seems intent on encouraging. Is he a madman or a visionary? Should he be shunned or embraced? Censured or forgiven?

These are the wrong questions, but their persistence reveals the truth about this shrewd and bloody-minded filmmaker. He is an entertainer. He will be publicized, and he will be paid.

----------------------------------

“Apocalypto” is rated R (Under 17 must be accompanied by parent or adult guardian).

Directed by Mel Gibson; written (in Maya, with English subtitles) by Mr. Gibson and Farhad Safinia; director of photography, Dean Semler; edited by John Wright; music by James Horner; production designer, Tom Sanders; produced by Mr. Gibson and Bruce Davey; released by Touchstone Pictures. Running time: 138 minutes.

WITH: Rudy Youngblood (Jaguar Paw), Dalia Hernandez (Seven), Jonathan Brewer (Blunted), Raoul Trujillo (Zero Wolf), Gerardo Taracena (Middle Eye), Rodolfo Palacios (Snake Ink), Fernando Hernandez (High Priest), Maria Isidra Hoil and Aquetzali Garcia (Oracle Girls) and Abel Woolrich (Laughing Man).