Sweet Grass Embers in Lawrence By: Millicent Michelle Pepion
Sweet Grass Embers in Lawrence Introduction Preface 1. Sovereignty 2. Removal 3. Indian Crabs 4. Genocide 5. Politics 6. Identity 7. Immigrants 8. Resiliency 9. Spirituality 10. Family 11. Love
In Closing
Preface It was dinner time on Saturday, May 12, 2012. Gatherers converged at the powwow grounds where cars and trucks galloped across each other on the west lawn towards the drums. Everyone was celebrating those graduating. While the sun gently worked its way down for the night, veterans met at the east entrance of the circular dance arena stoic between two portable bleachers full of Indians, mostly. Wearing a pink shawl I borrowed from a lady nearby, I took my place behind the eagle staff and American flags; alongside all the proud men and women who served our country, and eventually found themselves at Haskell Indian Nations University. The dancers began forming a line behind us. First, was the newly-elected Mr. and Mrs. Haskell, also the lead male and female dancers, followed by royalty from visiting nations, followed by northern traditional dancers and southern traditional dancers, followed by fancy dancers, grass dancers, and chicken dancers; followed by beaver-braided shawl dancers, and silver and turquoise accented jingle dancers. Lastly, the tiny tots were followed by their parents guiding them. Manny King let everyone know it was powwow time and the crowd surrounding stood to show their respect for the eagle staff, American flags, veterans, students, and dancers. We all danced in sync until everyone was inside the circle. The eagle staff and American flags ended saluting the King facing west. A plume of dirt rose as we stopped for a moment to honor our flag song then together we exited in a clockwise motion. After grand entry I walked to Haskell’s Medicine Wheel with a small group of people. I wondered how we were going to get to from that place to Washington D.C. The truck I had bought to help us on our way died. We only had Shireen’s car and $600. Wanderers were coming up to us asking what we were trying to accomplish by heading to Congress. We told them we weren’t even sure if we were going anymore. Smokey saw the look of complete failure in my eyes and quietly retreated inward to rationalize what he was about to do. Dr. Smokey McKinney, is an English professor at Haskell. He is one of those quiet thinkers who seem reserved on the outside, but are really bursting with love, and life, and music inside. Smokey went back to his house with the Kansas sunset sweet and low, as our small group headed back to the apartment, heads down and hearts full. Mary and Julia, my roommates, were trying to console me. There was a part of Mary that didn’t want her to go. His name is Josh. And there was two parts of Julia, Jackson and Shireen, that did. Around 11 pm, I started getting texts from Smokey. He wanted me to meet him that night. I texted back that he would have to come to our quadroplex on 13th street, because I had no way to get to him. He pulled up around midnight. I told everyone I would be right back. I hopped in Smokey’s car, a black Mazda 3 station wagon, and we headed to his house. Smokey told me that he really wanted to see the Trail of Broken Promises journey come to life. He particularly wanted me to write about it. Intermittently, he’d tell me about all of the little quirks his station wagon suffered. He asked if I was comfortable driving stick. I told him I’m one those Indian girls who learned how to drive stick on the back roads of the Grand Canyon. Smokey loaned me his car under two conditions: (1) I was to look for another car on the way, (2) I promised to write about what I would experience. After filling the trunk with old camping gear (chairs, sleeping bags, tents) Smokey handed me the keys to Black Mambo and I faded into the Kansas summer night. It wasn’t until almost 3 months later that I would see him again. This book is especially dedicated to Smokey McKinney and his family. And to all who help as the embers of a vacant dream vanquish into the ashes of a dying fire.
SOVEREIGNTY On Sunday, May 13, 2012, the alarm on my phone was set to 5:00 am. I wanted to catch the sunrise in the wetlands before we left. I woke the others up and together we packed up our belongings and proceeded south down Massachusetts Avenue (Mass) to Haskell’s Medicine Wheel. I was a graduate that year and had been offering free tours of the medicine wheel all semester. Haskell’s Medicine Wheel is what Stan Herd, lead creator, refers to as “earth art.” It’s roughly the size of a small practice football field but resembles the shape of a circle with four sections. A fire pit sits in the middle. Haskell’s Medicine Wheel was carved on the north side of the Wakarusa Wetlands, a wetlands prairie once connected to Haskell’s campus. I would offer a tour of the medicine wheel almost every Saturday morning at 9 am that year, and whenever a tour was wanted. The tours were for educational purposes. I would inform participants about the history of Haskell, or the history of the Medicine Wheel, or the history of the South Lawrence Trafficway, or my own personal history of how I ended up there in Lawrence at Haskell leading tours of Haskell’s Medicine Wheel in an effort to protect the Wakarusa Wetlands from becoming the South Lawrence Trafficway. Most people who frequent Lawrence are usually taken back by the city’s historic downtown area where a dilapidated Masonic temple sits among funky, local businesses, mostly there to entertain the University of Kansas students and their families. The entire town was burned twice before by proslavery attempts to keep Kansas from becoming a free state. Today bars and coffee shops string one after another down Mass, their main street. Vintage clothing stores, record stores, and antique everything stores are dispersed here and there. The average tourist might start at the entrance to downtown, at the Mass and 9th Street intersection, and travel south for fun. At 23rd street most people are inclined to turn either east or west, not even realizing there is a third option- straight. Haskell Indian Nations University is a four-year university offered exclusively for students who are enrolled in a federally recognized tribe. There are around a thousand or so students each semester, yet there are roughly over 130 nations represented. Nowhere else in the world have I been able to eat amongst so many tribes whose nations span the whole United States. In my short time there I made friends with Indians from remote Alaskan villages to coastal communities that precede states such as Washington, Oregon, California, Texas, Alabama, and Florida. Not to mention all the students who come from reservations in between such as Idaho, Nevada, Utah,New Mexico, Arizona, Wyoming, Colorado, Montana, the Dakotas, Arkansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, North Carolina, Mississippi and so on. In my Introduction to Indigenous and American Indian Studies class a fellow student, one of Haskell’s star basketball players, introduced himself as a Narragansett Indian. His tribe’s nation is located in Rhode Island. They were “discovered” in 1524 by Giovanni de Verranzo, a European explorer who was visiting what is now the Narragansett Bay. Over a century later, during the 1670’s, the entire tribe was nearly eradicated when they sided with the Massachusetts Indians in King Philips War. King Philip is a nickname for Metacomet, son of Massasoit, a Massachusetts Indian chief credited for saving the pilgrims from starvation at Plymouth. According to prominent American history forums, King Philip’s War was, “perhaps the most devastating war in this country's
history. One in ten soldiers on both sides were wounded or killed.” At the beginning of the war King Philip and his troops nearly sent Europeans back to their homelands. By the end of the war, after the Pequot and Mohawk Indians joined the British, the few remaining Narragansett members were either forced on to a small reservation where they would be killed if they left, or they were sold into slavery, or they fled the area under other excruciating circumstances. In 1740, a church was erected to convert the Narragansett people to Christianity. That three acre plot is the only land the tribe has possessed continually since. Like most tribes their communities were slowly consumed by early settlers, greedy for land and ready to get rid of anything that stood between. The tribe had little over 15,000 acres shortly before the 1880’s when Rhode Island illegally detribalized the entire Narragansett nation. It took the Narragansett people a century to undo what Rhode Island did in a few short years. Finally, in 1983, nearly five centuries after first contact with European explorers, the Narragansett Indians were re-given federal recognition. The tribe now has over 1800 acres just outside Charlestown, Rhode Island with a little over 2400 members. And there I sat with one of those members in some Haskell classroom with other Haskell students whose families share a similar history with the United States government. He was probably born only a couple years after they regained their sovereign status. Sovereignty is a common theme at Haskell. You could say it is the foundation of their Indigenous and American Indian Studies program. It is also a focal point for Haskell Business and Tribal Management majors. Merriam-Webster defines “sovereignty” as, “a country’s independent authority and the right to govern itself.” Indian nations have constantly and consistently been at odds with the United States over infringements to their sovereign rights. The Narragansett nation’s history is but a drop of rain in the thunderstorm of sovereignty issues Indian nations have faced and will continue to battle for forever it seems. Haskell’s Medicine Wheel is an emblem for tribal sovereignty, and it is a reflection of the many dynamics concerning the rebuilding and revitalization of Native people’s communities and cultures. It was created in 1992 to commemorate the 500 th anniversary of Columbus’s infamous journey. As Dr. Daniel Wildcat has said time and again, “We aren’t supposed to be here.” He’s referring to the centuries of atrocities inflicted upon Indian people simply for being here. Dr. Wildcat is the Dean of the Science Department at Haskell and co-creator of Haskell’s Medicine Wheel. He has explained to me before that in a way the Haskell’s Medicine Wheel is also a protest that we have not left and never will. That no matter what the US government has done to rid themselves of their Indian problem, including the mass genocide of Indian people and their cultures that we are still here. When we crossed 23 rd street on Mass that morning, and headed straight towards the south end of Haskell’s campus, I felt the weight of Haskell’s Medicine Wheel on my back. In 2009, when I first came to Lawrence, I began working part-time as a cashier at the Community Mercantile (The Merc!), a popular organic foods market in Lawrence. While I was there I was shocked to find that not too many Lawrencians dared to cross 23 rd street to Haskell’s campus. They just sort of left us alone; partly, because they had been told to for over a century. Haskell began as a traditional Indian boarding school. Mandatory education was necessary for all Indian children if they were to “Kill the Indian,” and, “Save the Man.” Students were brought to Haskell whether they wanted to be there or not. These institutions of assimilation were almost never talked about positively in the town’s they neared. Instead of helping make these schools succeed, most of the people in town were told lies about why it was there, who was paying for it, who Indian people are, but mostly they were told to stay away.
Several of my friends in Lawrence hardly frequented the wetlands. And when I would invite my friends from The Merc! to come visit my campus an eerie look would cross their face and they would be either be momentarily mystified, scared, or amused, but rarely did anyone actually visit. Most Lawrence community members, as I found, preferred to turn their head to the issues that happened at Haskell. It’s a shame too, since Haskell is one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. They have a cross country running path that spans the entire campus, the medicine wheel, the wetlands, and even connects to other paths that surround the City of Lawrence. You can see a point of entrance as you pull up to the Haskell powwow grounds, once you cross 23 rd street continuing straight on Mass. The track has several paths to follow for travelers in all directions. From the powwow grounds, you can head west where the track eventually intersects with Broken Arrow elementary school. A school built after Haskell donated the land for its construction. Broken Arrow is a symbol for peace in some tribes. If you decide to trek east from the powwow grounds there is a path that connects to Haskell’s Rail Trail, once a thriving train track it is now cemented, lit, and designed to exercise on. When trains frequented these tracks there was a special stop reserved only for students of Haskell. It is now a slab of dormant concrete hidden beside Haskell’s cemetery. If you were to take Haskell’s Rail Trail north, past the cemetery, past the old station, past Haskell campus, past 23rd street you’ll find the sidewalk/ lit track becomes Burroughs’ Creek Trail, named after William Burroughs a famous Lawrence resident and author. This trail eventually ends at the Kansas River where it meets other trails that go other places. If you don’t want to travel by foot to Haskell’s Medicine Wheel then you can take Mass Ave to Barker and park at the edge of the practice softball field. With all our gear overfilling Black Mambo we parked there beside the locked rusty green gate. The gate is open only to Haskell facility members who maintain these paths and the medicine wheel. A sign on the gate says ‘No Trespassing, Keep Out.” On my tours I would always say that sign was meant for developers, not for them. The dirt path we are walking on is Barker Ave. In the town of Lawrence, Barker runs parallel to Mass. Lawrence people often travel on Barker to avoid the chaos the downtown area attracts, especially when KU’s men’s basketball team is playing. When you travel south on Barker, like Mass, it continues pass 23rd street. If you were to stop at the intersection of Barker and 23rd street looking towards Haskell you would see the Haskell Catholic Center on the right and Haskell’s athletic dorm, Osceola-Keoukuk Hall, on the left. OK Hall is named after two of the first three buildings built on Haskell’s campus. Osceola Hall housed the boys and Keokuk Hall housed the girls. Both dorms burned down tragically where Sequoyah Hall now is; and OK Hall was positioned along 23 rd street, where Haskell’s cemetery was before they moved it, or so they say. A few unknown graves in Haskell’s cemetery are believed to be students who died in those fires. Other students are believed to still be buried in the rubble that engulfs Sequoyah Hall’s basement. Other, other students are believed to still be buried under OK Hall. Continuing south down Barker Ave pass the Haskell Arch, an entrance to the first lit stadium west of the Mississippi, pass Haskell’s Cultural Center, a museum dedicated to preserving the history of Haskell and home to Haskell’s traditional medicines garden, pass the Pushmataha building, named after the only Indian buried in Arlington cemetery, pass Stidham Hall, a building constructed by Haskell students, for Haskell students, named after a former Haskell student and NFL coach Tom Stidham.; pass the great, bronze Indian warrior statue in
front of the auditorium where Thunderbird Theater was founded, pass Hiawatha the first building built on Haskell campus and one of the oldest buildings registered to the Kansas Historical Society, pass the bandstand, pass Sequoyah Hall formerly the site of Osceola Hall and Keoukuk Hall, pass where Haskell’s jail cells were, pass the library and chow hall, pass the co-ed dorm, pass the freshman boys dorm, pass the facilities building, pass a large oak tree, pass the golfing range, pass the old green gate, pass the practice softball field, to the east, is the gateway to Haskell’s Medicine Wheel. The trees guarding the medicine wheel sound like the Pacific Ocean on windy days. The path leading up to the medicine wheel from Barker is rough, but close to the threshold I’ve seen wild strawberries growing during the spring semester. Once I even watched a black snake curl up to the cedar tree opposite the wild strawberry patch, and die. Its body, over the next few weeks, wilted in to the ground. The smell was horrendous but I couldn’t get myself to move its body. I know the cedar trees’ roots thrive on these chance encounters, at least that’s what I would tell my tour guests. Just as you pass through the somewhat windy, topsy turvy walkway you’ll find yourself standing in the threshold of Haskell’s Medicine Wheel. I love coming in and seeing a fire dancing in the middle like I did that morning. A typical medicine wheel, whether it is the size of a dream catcher or the size of Haskell’s Medicine Wheel, consists of a circle with four points, one point for each direction. One time, on a tour through the wetlands, our guide, Patrick Austin Freeland, told a group of us students that we must never forget to honor the other 3 directions (up, down, and within). I recounted this story on my tours often. An animal marker was placed in each direction of the earth art creation. The west has a giant bear paw carved out of thick brown mud. Stan Herd had come a few weeks before with a group of volunteers and revamped the bear paw. I had never seen it so established in my tenure at Haskell. It looked like a fresh tattoo healing in the earth. A piece of Osceola and Keokuk Halls are placed within a circle to honor early students. Current students place little knick knacks and what nots on these shrines. I tried never to enter through any other direction except for the east. On the Navajo reservation, where I was born, the front doors of our traditional homes face east, towards the rising sun. When you enter a Hogan from the east then you proceed clockwise around the fire to wherever you’re going. I applied this knowledge to my tours. It would let guests know why we were walking in a half circle just to get to a fire pit straight ahead of them. It also gives guests an idea of just how big Haskell’s Medicine Wheel is. The boys, minus Wayne, were camping just north of the bear claw and were gearing up for our first day on the road with fresh coffee and morning stretches. The northern and southern points have opposite facing deer paws for their animal emblems. Just pass the northern deer paw is a sewer hole. Most of Lawrence’s sewage passes beneath the medicine wheel and Haskell on its way to the treatment center neighboring Haskell’s campus. Not so surprisingly, Indian land often neighbors dumpsites and sewage plants. Lawrence shares a similar relationship with Haskell. As you round the northeast quadrant you can make out a thunderbird’s head. It’s made out of bushes and trees that provide ample shade to rest in the summertime. The thunderbird is the largest animal of Haskell’s Medicine Wheel. Its size is equal to the circle it neighbors. It is so big, the best way to see the Thunderbird is through pictures taken from helicopters above. The eastern shrine is situated between two poles marking where the sun rises during the winter and summer solstices. Mike Caron was behind that project. He is a Haskell enthusiast whose
contributions to Haskell and the wetlands span over three decades. Mike knew how much I loved the eastern entrance. He carved a little fire pit there for me so that I could smudge tour participants before they entered the circle. I’ve prayed here countless times whether alone or with a group. It is a sacred place to me. The people who made it out that morning would’ve shared a prayer with me at the eastern entrance. Then we would have proceeded to the center of the medicine wheel, around the fire. We were all anxiously looking around at one another. We stood together in a makeshift circle and introduced ourselves. I wonder if they know we were standing at the center of the universe. I can’t remember the exact order that we introduced ourselves, but I was probably first. Leonard Paul Lowery III was there next to me, holding my hand. He goes by the name Trey. My uncle Stanley Perry who came from Window Rock, AZ, was there. A nice lady he met at the powwow was there too. Mary Iorio, my dear cousin and her dog Willie were there. Julia Trechak, who would become the group’s writer, was there. Julia’s two friends from Wichita, Shireen Omadi-Hamadari and Jackson Shadd, were there. Mary’s boyfriend, Joshua Cunningham, was there and so was his best friend, Chad Buttram. Most of the boys were there: Mark Olsen, Chad Crisco, and Issac Mitchell. Wayne Yandell had spent the night at a friends’ place and was in the process of heading back. Finally, there was a traveler there who Mary and I had housed for a week or so. His name was Garret. He was just some krusty kid on his way nowhere. He was there. After we introduced ourselves I told the group that it was imperative that we started at the Wakarusa Wetlands holiest place, the dump. It was where I first met Dr. Teresa Milk, a Lakota professor at Haskell, and author of Haskell Institute: Stories of Sacrifice and Survival. She taught me how to listen to the stories thriving in the wetlands. The dump is definitely easier to get to when the weather’s dry, like it was that morning. I explained to the group that we just had to hop back on to Barker Ave and head south to the Wakarusa River. When we walked to the dump that morning we simply trekked across what can be a small pond sometimes, but mostly is just thick slippery black mud. We stopped and looked at Haskell’s Boardwalk. That was a four year CGIU commitment that I had helped create. Now I was taking on my own CGIU commitment with this walk. I remember I walked faster than everyone else that morning because I was ashamed that so few people were seeing us off. The weather was perfect though. When we finally crossed 31 st street in to Baker University’s wetlands area, ducks were scattered about quaking as usual. I pointed to the poles used to mark where the freeway would be put in. They had pink flags attached to the tops of each one. I remember thinking I can’t turn back now. The wetlands were singing to us, blessing our journey. The dump is literally just that. During the Termination Era of the 1950’s, when the federal government was disenfranchising the Menominee nation along with several other tribes, some Lawrence residents were scheming ways to relinquish the Haskell wetlands from Haskell campus. Mike Caron has done research concerning a specific professor who was behind all the land deals. Part of convincing the federal government to sell the Indian land was to prove the Indians didn’t need it and were not using it. That KU professor and others in positions of power rallied up the Lawrence community and convinced everyone it was a dump site. The amount of garbage there is at least 6 layers deep and there is evidence that the amount of trash left actually diverted the Wakarusa River to some degree. Dr. Charles Haines, an ethnobiology professor at Haskell, told me he believes that is where hundreds more Haskell students are buried. Dr. Haines has conducted extensive research
on Haskell’s school attendance records and found that over a thousand students who were reported as leaving school for home, never actually made it home. He checked their tribal trusts and other tribal records who reported them as missing indefinitely after attending Haskell Indian Boarding School. The reason Haskell would want these records destroyed, and those students buried in the wetlands, is because they couldn’t report how many students were dying otherwise the government might have stopped funding them. There’s a good chance that they might have still funded them knowing what was happening there too. Dr. Haines hypothesizes students were led off Haskell campus, to the dump, where they were either buried after being murdered or buried already dead from other causes. Then a few decades later, the Lawrence community literally came and trashed their mass grave, covering up two atrocities that happened to early Haskell students, their death and their burial ground. Dr. Milk has really energized this otherwise lifeless tomb. Like any good Indian she created a circle around a fire pit, even crafting places for people to sit. She went a step further and made an area perfect for hosting barbeques. The first night I met Dr. Milk we barbequed hot dogs and she told us stories. I watched in awe as Dr. Milk shared her insight with us beside the crackling cedar fire. Behind her in the shadows listening were the silhouettes of very tall spirits. The only other times I’ve seen them was in a Yu-wi-pi ceremony. As I recall, a beaver was there too. I took out an abalone shell given to me by my Auntie Lola who had passed the year before, and began mixing a concoction consisting of mostly of sage, with some shreds of tobacco and sweet grass. We passed the shell around and smudged ourselves. Then we said a prayer and left. I wanted the Trail of Broken Promises to start at the dump and end on the footsteps of Congress in the most humble way. When we returned to the medicine wheel we were making final preparations. It seemed most of the members left something they really needed and everyone was making trips back and forth to their homes to get everything ready. Trey and I sat underneath a tree with long hanging branches and peeling white bark next to a parking area by the medicine wheel gate watching everyone prepare. My Aunt Brenda came up in her van and asked if she could say an Apache prayer for me. We hugged and she pulled out a giant freezer bag full of yellow corn pollen. It was the most corn pollen I have ever seen in my life. Traditional Navajo people carry a tiny bag that has a fingernail full of To-da-diin with them at all times. That’s what we call it. Other tribal members put a small amount into a medicine bag and wear it around their neck underneath their shirt at all times. Trey does that. She could’ve been mistaken for dealing it. I’ve never seen anybody do that. As she reached in to her ginormous corn pollen bag I was smiling. I love my Aunt Brenda. She began flinging handfuls of the corn pollen out in all directions praying to the holy people to protect me, and protect us and our cause. Then she doused me in corn pollen and begged the creator to help me, to guide me, to be with me, and to show his love to me so that I wouldn’t be scared. She said a quiet prayer for the wetlands. Then she hugged me again. Trey asked if he could be next. She did a short prayer for him, nothing nearly as extravagant as what she had done for me. Afterwards she grabbed my face and told me I had to come back home. She warned me not to give in to temptation or quit, and to pray every morning I woke up, and every night I went to sleep, and every time I was scared. I thanked her dearly and turned my attention towards the group. Everything was coming together. Wayne was back. I watched as Julia and Shireen made a youtube video. Julia was throwing a series of one word posters to Bob Dylan’s, “Subterranean Homesick Blues,” blasting
from Shireen’s blue Mazda. The boys were somewhat grateful as they tied their backpacks to the top of Smokey and Shireens’ cars, surprised we had wheels for our journey. Later, when we were in Brunswick, Missouri, they told me they were under the impression we were walking the whole way to DC. I informed them of how we could conduct our journey in a way that would allow for us to walk but not overwhelm ourselves. The point of our journey was not to walk to Washington D.C. for the wetlands but to walk and raise awareness about what was happening to the wetlands, a point I don’t think they ever understood. Around this time my Uncle Moey and my Aunt Brenda emerged from the wetlands carrying a stick. I was thinking how funny it was to have people from both my mother and father’s family coming together. My uncle informed us he found our wetlands staff. He told us that the wetlands issue directly relates to the story of what happened as a result of Mother Earth and Father Sky fighting. I tell my uncle’s story like this… A long time ago Mother Earth and Father Sky started fighting. Father sky had been punishing the human beings for disrespecting the different plants, and animals, and water systems provided for their existence. Mother Earth told Father Sky to leave, and to take with him his rags. He left and it was a dark time for Mother Earth. The people started killing and disrespecting each other more rampantly. Finally a group of human beings started praying again. They started singing again. The people began to be grateful for what little they had. Mother earth asked father sky to come back and to bring with him his rags, the clouds. A great storm happened that brought water and life back to their homelands, but in a way, it was too late. The land had become desert. That is why the Navajo people live in the desert. Since then the people have been giving thanks and praise for everything they have knowing it can all be taken away again. My aunt headed to her car and gave my uncle four eagle feathers to tie to unto the staff. She told us they were from the Blackfeet reservation. To my uncle, we were literally bringing the wetlands to Washington. My aunt reached in to her corn pollen bag and grabbed a handful to rub over the staff. She even worked some of the medicine in to the many crevices transforming it from a random stick into a genuine warrior’s staff. With our wetlands staff in hand we were ready to take on Washington D.C. My plan to organize the Trail of Broken Promises came after I had spent the fall 2011 semester immersed in The Web of Life, a book by Fritjof Capra. Capra introduced me to the concept of ‘systems thinking,’ or an understanding that the world is not the sum of its parts, “In fact there are no parts at all. What we call a part is merely a pattern in an inseparable web of relationships.” I was applying systems theory to every aspect of my own life after. I thought, if I could build our journey upon Capra’s principles then our plan should be foolproof. Little did I know it would be the most challenging aspect for some ToBP members to grasp. It turns out Capra’s explanation of the world is contrary to how most Americans are raised. And although, his teachings are the foundations of most traditional Native philosophies, most Indians in this past century learn western science as the foundation of their studies and interpretation of the world. Rarely will you meet an Indian these days who completely embraces the “traditional” way of life, of which Capra so beautifully articulates.
Following is a basic outline of the plan I designed for ToBP. There were to be four teams. Each team was assigned different tasks. The Land Team was in charge of all waste management, setting up and taking down the different campsites, making sure the campsites we stayed at were clean and manageable, finding interesting places for us to visit, and most importantly they would be in charge of mapping out the routes for the next day’s walk and preparing ToBP for upcoming weather conditions. The People Team would be in charge of all public relations. They would be in charge of sending out press releases and keeping in contact with the various news correspondents we’d meet along the way. They were also in charge of updating all social media sites, blogs, and video clips. The Animal Team was in charge of coordinating all the meals and cooking. They would ensure that all people were healthy enough to continue on and for that reason they were also in charge of knowing who was in need of urgent care. The last team were the drivers. They would wait for the different teams to finish walking, and calculate finances for entire group to ensure there would be enough money allocated for the three most important things you need to survive in the United States: food, gas, and water. Each team would have a main purpose but a representative from the other teams would be with them always. In this way every team would compose of all parts simultaneously. Furthermore, each person was encouraged to not limit themselves to one position. We wanted everyone to experience every team at least once. The chance to change roles would happen at the end of each cycle. The tentative arrival date (Monday, July 9th) was based around a cyclic schedule. Since it is roughly 1,325 miles from the Wakarusa Wetlands to Congress if we were to walk 30 miles each day it would only take us only 44 days to get there, under perfect weather conditions in a picture-perfect world. Our plan called for three groups to walk, each walking 10 miles a day for four days. Together we could cover a 120 mile distance each cycle, and then rest. Each cycle then consisted of 5 days: 4 walking days and one rest day. The entire journey had been broken up into 11 cycles. On any given walking day the first group would walk from point A to point B. The second group would walk from point B to point C. And the third group would walk from point C to point D. Normally point D was photographed and interviewed by local news stations. Ideally, point D would also serve as our campsite. The groups were free to walk whenever they wished, however, we highly encouraged people to finish their walks by mid-afternoon. There was a driver on each team and there were a lot of opportunities to not walk if you couldn’t or didn’t want to. And there were just enough walkers to do just that, but not on day one. On day one everyone who could walk did and we walked together stoically. A PowerPoint presentation which details the mechanics behind our walk is found at slideshare.net under the name “The Trail of Broken Promises Walk.” With the plan in place, and the cars packed to their brim, the big group photo was taken in front of Haskell’s cemetery. Eric Ingram, President of the Haskell’s Veterans Club, showed up and donated an American flag to us before we left. He said it was a gift from a club I miss being a part of. A token of some sorts I guess. We were all more than anxious to march through Lawrence. We were ready to show the Lawrence community that we were going to go to Washington DC about this wetlands issue. Maybe they could silence all of Haskell some of the time, and some of Haskell all of the time, but they couldn’t silence all of Haskell all of the time and we were living proof. We took the dirt path that leads to Haskell’s Rail Trail along the cemetery. I looked at the headstones once more. I felt the direction of my blood circulating clockwise. We took on Lawrence via Haskell’s Rail Trail. We crossed on to Borough’s Creek Trail visiting with one
another and laughing mostly. It was a good time. Tom, a man we met on Saturday night at the medicine wheel brought us cookies and $125 dollars. Two days later he wrote: Millie, I suppose you’re in D.C. by now, hope you’re having fun. Do let me know how things go with all of you. I was in the wetlands last night and watched a muskrat cross the pond I frequent while the songs of the frogs slowly came up. Venus still sits beneath the twinned stars of Gemini. I will head south to Mexico for a week or so, though I may try to catch the solar eclipse on the 20th before I do. I was impressed in listening to you at the Medicine Wheel on Saturday night, truly. Best wishes, Tom We left Burrough’s Creek Trail, and Tom, before 13 th street. Just before downtown, we stopped at the dangerously spiky gate, also an entrance to South Park, and gathered ourselves for a moment. Most of us smoked a cigarette. Some of us smoked two. Some of us just looked around anxiously. Then we commenced to parade down Mass. It was lunchtime. There were a lot of people from out of town visiting their friends and family members graduating from KU that morning. I believe KU’s graduation ceremony began in the 10 o’clock hour and it was well over 11 am when we passed through. Most of the people who saw us were bewildered by our chant, “Save it, Don’t Pave it!” They had no idea what we were talking about. Some random locals filled in onlookers here and there but for the most part everyone was pretty much confused by our protest. One person shined above the rest, Julia Good Fox. She was teaching the Intro to IAIS class where I met the Narragansett boy. She was with her daughter. They were peeking behind a thin tree when we passed them. I saw her aura glowing from a distance. Ms. Good Fox’s aura is one color and one color only, red. She gave me a reassuring glance that said she cared for us then casually turned the other way. She and her daughter were probably randomly downtown the same time we were as Haskell teachers aren’t allowed to voice their opinions concerning the wetlands. I don’t think someone like Ms. Good Fox would bend any rules. Mass Ave breaks at the intersection crossing 9 th street, then it cuts back on after the Kansas River. It is the only intersection in Lawrence that has an operator directing the blind, and apparently deaf. For as loud as it is you’d think there be more than just this one. I always wondered what possessed the city’s council to allocate money towards this project. Makes me question whether their motion to agree to support the mitigation of the wetlands for the construction of the South Lawrence Trafficway was rationalized. We stood awkwardly at that intersection exhausted from our chant with the operator’s voice blasting over us. We marched across 9th Street and on to the bridge that crosses the Kansas River. That bridge is always full of bird poop and dead critters, mostly cicadas. You can hardly touch the hand rails without getting slimed; and no matter what time of year it is, some type of crunching noise can be heard at your feet. Either moving insects of spring and summer, or the fallen dead leaves of autumn, or ice rocks in the winter time. I could hear old bird poop crunching as we walked and so I wiped my feet as I always did, in the grassy knoll at the small park there.
My aunt Brenda and her family were waiting for us. They had snacks and prayed for us again. They and the other people who accompanied us through Lawrence left us at that park. Then we divided up in to our teams. At this point in time we had two cars, Smokey’s and Shireen’s, twelve people and a dog. Needless to say the drivers were having to shuffle back and forth between the different points to accommodate everyone. My team consisted of Me, Trey, and Shireen (our driver). We were going to walk from point A (the park) to point B (Pat Murphy’s estate). He’s a dear friend of mine who helped tremendously during Haskell’s Buffalo Harvest. His estate is where the Haskell’s Buffalo Harvest was held. I tightened my shoelaces and off we went. We waved goodbye to the others who were still organizing. Truthfully I wanted to run away. I was disappointed that the protest did not go as planned. I was also embarrassed that we did not get more support from Haskell or my fellow students, or the City of Lawrence. Mainly, I was disappointed with myself. We tiptoed through north Lawrence rarely making a sound. When we passed their vacant downtown area we peeked in to a closed church to see if anyone was inside who could let me in to use the restroom. No one was there. We were walking along the houses by the railroad when I saw a man cleaning his front yard. I introduced myself and asked if I could use his bathroom. He agreed and let me in. Trey waited outside and smoked a cigarette. The guy wished me luck when we left and we proceeded to the dusty landscape in front of us. We had asked Shireen to leave us water when she passed by with second group (Mary, Julia, Jackson, Chad and Willie). She sent us a picture text of where the water was after we had passed it. The sun was heavy on our face. We rested in the shade of the I-10 overpass. We were halfway to Pat’s when a hawk flew over us. Trey put down some tobacco. When we got closer to the tree where the hawk was he flew to a pole on the street Pat lives off of. Then we walked under him. It was like he knew what we were doing and he was giving us his blessing. Or he was just doing what he normally does on Sunday afternoons and our paths just happened to intersect. We passed the I-10 for a second time, and I knew it was exactly one more mile to Pat’s. Day one was almost over, one more mile to go. Then it would be day two, and day three, and before you know it we would be in Washington D.C. We turned down the dirt road to Pat’s house. Joshua Falleaf’s brother was there. Joshua Falleaf is an English professor at Haskell. His brother is not. Josh’s brother was setting up the stages for ‘Festy Fest’, a three day outdoor concert Pat had been hosting for the past few years. Pat came out of his triangular shaped house to greet us. He showed me how much meat they still had to cure and invited me to take a bbq buffalo rib. I teared into the warm meat remembering my dear friend who I had just met alive the week before. He asked me if I was ready. I told him I was as ready as I could be. Shireen was parked in a tree away from them listening to music. We piled in to her blue Mazda and she handed us some cookies; the ones Tom had given us as we were walking down Burrough’s Creek Trail. Shireen has Persian eyes. She is Persian and Muskogee Creek. Her heritage shines through her eyes and cheekbones; and her smile is as radiant and pure as any I’ve ever seen. She looked like a pinup girl in her 50’s styled sunglasses. Shireen listens to all the classics; John Coltrane, Bessie Smith, Al Green, Otis Redding, and the like. When we drove away from Pat’s House we were listening to a song similar to, “Ode to Billy Joe,” a 1967’ hit about a small town love story that tragically and mysteriously ends at the Choctaw Ridge. Nothing is too fantastic about that song except the mezzo-soprano vocal line sung by the voluptuous Bobbie Gentry. Shireen has the spirit of the girl sitting at the table in that song.
She gave us an update of everyone. We told her we couldn’t find the water. She suggested that it might not be a good idea to leave water anymore. I concurred. Our plan was open to constant changes and it would have to be if we were going to reach Washington D.C. by July 9th, or at all. We turned on to the old Lindwood Road, a dirt road that parallels the new Lindwood Road, which is also the town of Linwoods’ main road. We were following the route group 2 was taking, hoping to spot them. I took extra special care planning the routes intended for the first day. I especially cared for group 2’s route because I was hoping little Julia would take it. Julia (which we pronounced in Spanish) is an English major at the University of Kansas. She was my neighbor all year. We had grown to be sisters, her, Mary, and I. She is not Indian even a bit, but that didn’t stop her from protesting with us for an Indian cause. She whole-heartedly believes the Wakarusa Wetlands are a sacred place that should be protected, and for reasons only she can feel. I hoped she would notice all the little nothings I thought she could write about. And she did in the Trail of Broken Promises tumblr page: Our first day on the Trail of Broken Promises took the Land team through a long stretch of rural road through northern Kansas. Myself, Jackson, Mary, Chad, and our dog, Willi, walked 8 miles, a majority of which was gravel, and the other times was the side of 31 N. We picked up one bag of trash on the way. There was a lot of scenery to take in, like a turtle crossing the road and horses behind fences and walls of trees on the horizon. We stopped and handed them some snacks and water. We honked as we left. The next stop was point C, the drop off point for group 3 and pick up point for group 2. We only stopped for a second to see if my uncle was okay. He was. We followed the boys’ route. They were walking along the Kansas river. Mark looked like a mountain man with his burly beard and 40 pound army backpack he insisted on carrying with him. Crisco, who we referred to by last name to distinguish between the two Chad’s, was wearing his army hat and carrying the American flag. Other than myself, Crisco was the only other veteran we had making it only proper for him to carry the flag. Wayne was leading the way with the wetlands staff in hand, and Isacc was lagging behind. We saw Isacc first. Sadly he was already limping. We stopped and asked the boys if they would like some water or snacks, then we drove off to the headquarters of the United Tribe of the Shawnee Indians (UTOSI), a tobacco shop owned by Jim Oyler, Sr., Principle Chief of UTOSI. Jim Sr. is probably the most straightforward old man you’ll ever meet. He doesn’t tell you lies, and he doesn’t sugarcoat anything either. Years of fighting Johnson County, Kansas State, and the U.S. government over his sovereign rights has left his skin thick and tough. He uses an oxygen machine now, but that doesn’t stop him from telling you what injustices happened to him and his family since they moved back to their nation near De Soto, Kansas. The Pitch, a popular college magazine free to KU students and Lawrence community members, wrote about Jim Sr. in 2003, though the writer, Kendrick Blackwood, did not do a very good job of portraying this Shawnee Chief. Non-Indian writers tend to do that having little or no understanding of what sovereignty is. Like any good Indian, Jim Sr. is a veteran. He fought in the Korean War as an Army infantry soldier after enlisting in Oklahoma at the age of 15. His greatgreat-great grandparents, Newton and Nancy McNearm, were allocated less than 100 acres during a treaty signed between the Shawnee Indians and US government in 1854. All his
Oklahoma life, Jim Sr.’s mother and father told him about land their family governed surrounded by Kansas. They encouraged him to go back and care for it one day. When Jim Sr. retired from the Navy in 1975 he went back home and situated his family on a 20 acre plot alongside 83 rd street, where the boys were currently walking. To most Kansas residents, who do not study American history, this 20 acre property resides in Johnson County of Kansas State not knowing that this area has never been a part of either one. UTOSI is Indian land. It was never ceded to Kansas, and it never will be. Jim Sr.’s too stubborn to ever let the government win. I wouldn’t be surprised to hear he’s even devised a plan to keep the Indian land going through death. I first met the Oylers on a chance encounter preparing for the Trail of Broken Promises and Haskell’s Buffalo Harvest. As I stated before, I took special consideration in planning the first day’s walk. When I was looking for a place to camp for the first night I stumbled upon UTOSI. Jim Sr.’s son, Jim Jr. was there. He’s a very loud and gregarious man with a long, white hair always braided. I humbly asked Jim Jr. about UTOSI and he proudly boasted the history of UTOSI and his Shawnee family. Tecumseh was Shawnee. During the time leading up to the War of 1812, Tecumseh tried to unite all the Indians as one to take over the United States. He encouraged Indians to act like Indians, to pray like Indians, to eat Indian food, to wear Indian clothing, and to speak in only Indian languages. He warned us Indians that the white man was trying to take all those away from us in an effort to plunder our land and decimate our families and cultures. Tragically, Tecumseh’s dream died in the grasslands of Ohio. His body is buried somewhere nearby. His people were forced to move west during the Indian Removal era shortly after. They were given land in what is now Missouri and Kansas, and then later promised more land if they moved to Oklahoma. Because there were so few Shawnee left in Oklahoma, the US government relinquished their federal recognition. Some of the Shawnee members were relegated to the Cherokee Nation. All the other Shawnee members were supposed to remain forgotten. Jim Sr. didn’t forget. His family told him about their journey to Oklahoma, and their home in Kansas. They told him not to forget that he was an Indian. His beating red blood assured him he was despite his pale complexion. The boys are all pale-skinned too, and like Jim Sr. they are all what are considered to be Oklahoma Indians. Wayne is Oklahoma Choctaw (like Trey), Mark is Citizen-band Potawatomi, Crisco is of the Kaw Nation, and Isacc is Osage and Cherokee. The boys walked up to us as we were touring UTOSI’s badlands. Jim Jr. took me, Julia, my uncle, and Wayne on a short ride to where Jim Sr. was. He lives in a house nestled away from where we were camping, overlooking the lake they’re building. Jim Sr. was so happy to see us. He was sifting through all his papers looking for anything to show us that we might be interested in. He assured us that we were on Indian land. He told us how the Kansas government has treated him for years, but how he represented himself and eventually beat them in court winning the rights to sell tobacco at their little store. He told us about the lake they were building. He showed us his computer while CNN blasted throughout the areas of his cluttered house. It was not hard to hear him over his oxygen machine, but it was hard for him to hear us. I tried to not to say much because of the communication hurdles. Wayne was overwhelmed with emotions when he spoke to Jim Sr. Later on he would than me for taking him there after he finished his walk. Jim Sr. took some pictures with us. Me, Julia, and Moey stood behind him in one pic and Wayne took one alone with just the two of them. Both are posted on our Tumblr page. We thanked him for housing us that night and for the port-a-potties he rented. After the local wildlife
came up to greet us, he hand us over to the care of his son and we spent the rest of the night laughing and joking with Jim Jr. Jim Jr. told everyone he gave me an Indian name, “I Wa-ka-ru-sa.” He explained that to the Kaw Indians, who originally inhabited the wetlands, that the word “Wakarusa” means “waste deep,” or as Jim Jr. crudely would say, “ASS deep.” The Kaw Indians called their river Wakarusa because the water level was waste deep when they crossed. He further explained that I was ASS deep in the fight to save the Wakarusa Wetlands, “I” was “Wa-ka-ru-sa,” that summer and so was everybody who was with me. He also jokingly, and non-jokingly, warned us about the Wakarusa ticks that thrive in the Midwest. For the remainder of the evening we sat next to a raging fire Jim Jr. made. Isacc showed me the gigantic blisters on his feet that happened in their ten mile walk. We all agreed he should be exempt from walking until they healed. We wondered about the box of fireworks that Jim had prepared for us. The fireworks were part of a long battle with the state that refused UTOSI’s right to sell them. Jim Jr. kept telling us how we were in for a real treat. We waited eagerly for the night to appear. When the time was right we asked to opened the box and commenced the firework show. Jim Jr. had strobe lights, smoke bombs, roman candles, M-80’s, a string of a thousand poppers, and so forth. Wayne lit most of the fireworks. He would light them then run for cover as all of us would watch the Kansas sky illuminate with colors of auburn, emerald, and indigo. We were laughing and joking all the while. After about a half an hour, a police officer arrived with colors of his own. Jim Jr. left the circle and walked towards the officer. “You left your lights on,” he repeated as he walked up to the man. The officer informed him that it was against Kansas law to have fireworks during a celebration, or anytime. Jim Jr. informed the Dorothy officer that he was not in Kansas anymore. Furthermore, the fireworks were a gift to us and a blessing from UTOSI. He assured the officer we weren’t declaring war or anything. We were just having a good time. My uncle got up from the circle and thanked the officer for protecting and serving our land and water. The officer left without even a warning. He had no jurisdiction anyhow. Jim Jr. is the Sheriff of UTOSI, and his dad is Chief, regardless of what Kansas people or any people think. Just because their tribe has been reduced to his eight or so family members does not give the state or county the right to relinquish their sovereign status. Jim Sr. told me a tribe can have a million people or no people. No one has the right to extinguish their existence. The Oylers are their own tribe on their own land exercising their rights as a sovereign nation. Shortly after the cop left Jim thanked us for staying on their land and we all headed back to our respective tents. Mary was at the apartment with Josh who was still pleading with her to stay. I was in a junior tent nestled by Black Mambo. Trey was in my uncle’s one person tent mad that I would not sleep by him. My uncle was in a gigantic ten that the girls would later make theirs by everyone else. Later on that night, while everyone was sleeping, I crawled in to the one person tent with Trey. He unzipped his sleeping bag so that he could hold me. He did this for the rest of the night. I couldn’t sleep. I have insomnia anyway. I just laid there listening to him snore, replaying the events of our first day on the road over and over until I finally couldn’t distinguish between my thoughts and dreams. . Around probably 4 am, I woke up shivering cold. Kansas is naturally humid and in the early morning hours of May the air is cold and wet. I begged Trey to switch me spots before he finally did. I tried to drift back to sleep until I heard something moving around outside. Both Jims told me there were snakes where we camped. I felt uneasy and stayed awake the rest of the
morning. Jim Jr. came out around 8 am and asked us how we were. I gave him a poster that Stan Herd had given me and we all signed it for him. He told us one day that poster would be worth a million dollars and we believed him because we wanted to. Trey and I were in group 1 still, and like the day before, we were first to leave. We packed up our gear and waved goodbye to UTOSI and Jim Jr. We told the other group members we’d see them in a few hours when we were done walking. From 83 street, Trey and I traveled east beneath the mounting Kansas skies. Our goal was to take Shawnee Mission Blvd to point B, a lake where Shireen would pick us up. Before we left Jim’s we snacked on some granola bars and water, not nearly the 5 star accommodations we were used to at Curtis, Haskell’s chow hall. At 83 rd street and the Kansas pike, after we passed the Missouri state line, we stopped at a subway and ate lunch together. Trey had won a $10 subway card given in some promotion at Haskell a month before. I told him about a Shawnee lady I met name Bertha Cameron, who was a curator for the Kansas Historical Society. A couple weeks before the Trail of Broken Promises, Mary and I met with Bertha and she gave us a tour of all the different Shawnee relics that encompass that area of the world. She took us to a small plot of land next to a Mexican family’s house and told us that is where Tecumseh’s brother, Tes-skwa-ta-wa, was relocated after the War of 1812. She secretly showed me and Mary where Tenskwatawa body is believed to be buried. I wanted our group to walk there for our second day and that is what we did. She also showed us the Shawnee Indian Mission, an abandoned Indian boarding school, from which Shawnee Mission Parkway derives its name. Jim Jr. had told me it was a school for orphaned Indian children, and that it was a death camp for most of them. I’m sure a lot of people who frequent Shawnee Mission Parkway rarely think of the Shawnee Indian children who attended that school. I imagine it’s like Indian School Road back home in Phoenix, which shares a similar history. One day at Haskell, I was at work in the student center on my soapbox telling everyone about Shawnee Indian Mission and how I found it strange that it was built in 1839, one year after the Potawatomi Trail of Death. I also found it strange that when the second Shawnee Indian Mission burned in 1862 they never rebuilt it. Furthermore, I found it even stranger that they would name it Shawnee Indian Mission, because other Indians attended it as well. I mentioned the Shawnee students buried in Haskell’s cemetery. My co-workers and other students were always amused by my little history lessons. Kilan Jacobs, a fellow student and friend of mine, who was in the student center at the time came up to me before I left. He told me that his wife, Mary Shawnee, who was also a Haskell student and friend, is a descendent of that history, and that some of her family members went to Shawnee Indian Mission. He also told me that the town Shawnee in Kansas is named after her family. Trey and I were walking Shawnee Mission Parkway around the same time group 2 was walking towards Tenskwatawa’s place. Trey is a funny man. He is enrolled in the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, but was born and raised in Texas where a slew of Choctaw fled during the 1700’s. Wayne is from Texas too. Trey is very opinionated and is more than willing to tell anyone who wants to hear about his family’s history with the US government. Like the Potawatomi, the Choctaw walk their own Trail of Death. Trey believes his great-grandfather became an orphan on their walk. Trey is very proud of his Indian heritage. He has a water bird tattooed across his chest to honor the Native American Church, of which he is an active member. We walked along our route and talked about being together forever, as most couples who are in the honeymoon stage
do. At this point, Trey was new to me. I was still weary of his intentions and conscious and excited by his presence. We had our first fight walking up a hill away from Shawnee Mission Parkway. I asked him what he was going to do with me when I got old. He told me a bad joke about how when I turned 40 he was going to trade me in for two 20 year olds. We walked separate from each other for the rest of the way. We still weren’t talking when Shireen found us. It was hard for Shireen to find us because the location I picked out for point B, was a lake inside a gated community. She had dropped group B off somewhere else and was hoping we’d call her when we realized the mistake I made, and we did. She told us that we should invest some money into a road atlas. I told her there should be one at a gas station. We stopped at the first gas station we saw and bought one. I was still mad at Trey. Somewhere between that gas station and Tenskwatawa’s allotment Trey and I made up. By the time we got to the small plot of land where Tenskwatawa lived out his last days we were kissing and hugging on one another. I was holding his hand when I gave Shireen and Trey a tour of Tenskwatawa’s land. The neighborhood that surrounds Tenskwatawa’s place is like any other neighborhood in America. There is nothing too fantastic about this place except for its extraordinary history. The street that Teskwatawa’s family could live on is found at the back of a dead end road. Tenskwatawa’s land in on the north side of the street. Tenskwatawa’s cabin is not there anymore. Instead it is a gated area with nothing inside. A plaque at the entrance tells you that it is Indian land and gives a brief history of Tenskwatawa and his older brother Tecumseh. Tenskwatawa was born Lalaweithica which means “noise maker” in Shawnee. As a child, Lalaweithica was an annoyance. Where Tecumseh was good at everything and even goodlooking, Tenskwatawa was not. He was weak and unskilled. Their mother abandoned the two when Lalaweithica was still a small boy. Shortly after, while learning to hunt, he shot his eye out with an arrow. As an adult he turned to alcohol and was known to hit his wife in drunk rages. One night while lighting a pipe, Lalaweithica fell into a nearby campfire. Everyone in his village thought he was dead and began a burial ceremony for him. During his burial ceremony, Lalaweithica awoke and told the people around him about his vision. Lalaweithica was visited by the Great Spirit who warned him not to act like a white man, and to not drink. He claimed that if the Indian people were to succeed they would need to distinguish themselves from white society. He also told them that he received a new name, Tenskwatawa, “The Prophet.” He had enlisted followers from all over what is now the Midwest. Indian people from all around would come to visit him to ask for guidance and prayers. Without Tenskwatawa, Tecumseh would not have had as much success as he had. After Tecumseh died, Tenskwatawa helped the surviving Shawnee people as they were removed west from their homelands at the urging of the US government. When he reached Kansas City, MO, Tenskwatawa was given that small plot of land. He died in 1836 and is buried there. Bertha was part of a group that saved Tenskwatawa’s land from developers who were trying to profit from his land. She rallied with other members of her group and proved that noone except Tenskwatawa’s family could build on it. We walked around for a bit and prayed. Trey sang a song in Tenskwatawa’s honor and we lit some sage and smudged ourselves. Shireen took a picture of me and Trey in front of the gate before we left. We both made that picture our profile pic on Facebook, and for a short time we had matching profiling pics. I thought it was cute. By four pm everyone had finished their walk and we were circling Independence’s downtown area looking for the Trail of Death marker. A reporter from the Kansas City Star was going to meet us there to do an interview. The Trail of Death is what the Citizen Band
Pottawatomi people walked when they were forcibly relocated in 1838. A tribe of over 850 people were taken on a 2 month long journey that started in their homelands outside of Plymouth, Indiana and sent to Osawatomie, Kansas. Over 40 Pottawatomi people died on that journey, mostly children. In fact, the first person to die on that walk was a newborn child. It died at Mud Creek, the first campsite. The sex is unknown as is the name and burial place. Leading up to the Trail of Broken Promises I had been researching different routes to travel to Washington D.C. Several people at Haskell knew what I was doing and would give tidbits of information for me here and there. One day my friend Kelda Britton sent me a link to the Trail of Death’s Association website with a little note that said something like, “This is interesting, maybe it can help [smiley face].” I took one look at the Trail of Death and immediately tried to get a hold of somebody from that organization to help us. Within hours I was talking to Shirley Willard about symbolically walking the Trail of Death in reverse. Shirley is a founding member of the Trail of Death Association, the organization that tend to the Trail of Death markers and commemoration efforts. Shirley instantly fell in love with the idea of Haskell students walking the Trail of Death in reverse, and immediately started putting me in contact with everyone she knew who could help us. She even put me in contact with Keith Drury, a man who walked the entire Trail of Death and wrote a book about it. He sent me a copy of his book before we left. Shirley is an honorary member of the Citizen Band Potawatomi Nation and has dedicated decades of her life to preserving the history of the Citizen Band Potawatomi people and their emigration to Kansas. It all began one day in 1976, when her son Allen Willard decided he wanted to be an Eagle Scout. He asked his mom what she knew concerning any historical events that happened around their area. Shirley told him about the baby that died at Mud Creek just down the road from their house. Allen went there and decided he wanted to make a memorial to help people remember what happened. That was the first ToD marker, now there is one at almost every campsite from Indiana to Kansas. Our goal was to visit every marker we could along the ToD beginning at Independence, MO. This first marker was very important to us. Most of the markers are big boulders with a plaque on them that gives a brief description of what the Trail of Death is. Some of the markers include footnotes written by Jesse C. Douglas, who documented the Trail of Death for William Polke. Pollke was in charge of the emigration after Indiana. Once we found the ToD marker in Pioneer Springs Park, some of the group positioned themselves at the Truman/Noland intersection and were waving Trail of Broken Promises signs at people driving by. Some people were honking in support. I went to the back of Black Mambo to dig out my abalone shell. Smokey is a Citizen Band Potawatomie member. His grandfather, Chief Smoke, was forced to walk the Trail of Death in 1838. I thought about him as I mixed up my medicine concoction. I proceeded to walk in a clockwise circle around the boulder. Trey sang a song as I smudged everyone off. I left the ashes on the marker for the Holy People. My uncle was talking to a reporter from the Kansas City Star. The boys and Shireen were taking pictures of themselves by a cabin. A lady walked up to us as we were leaving and thanked us for what we were doing. Then she sang, “I can’t help falling in love with you.” It was awkward. We couldn’t camp at Pioneer Park so we drove to a campsite across town. Jacomo Lake is a nice place. The owner is part Blackfeet, like me. And like my dad, this man is a proud Navy veteran. We concluded it must be a Blackfeet thing to join the Navy. His campground is sectioned so that you can set up your tent in front of your car with the lights on. There is an
electricity outlet on each lot which was used to charge phones. Everyone had a phone, even my uncle who could barely use one. We sat around the campfire and got each other’s numbers. My uncle had Crisco set up his voicemail. We talked about what we were going to do the next day and how to make the trip better. Around sunset time Mike Ofor drove up in his light blue sedan with Mary. He was happy to announce that he was going to join the Trail of Broken Promises. We were relieved to have another car, and to have Mike. He’s always in good spirits. Michael Ofor’s nickname is Mufasa because of his giant afro and tendency to sing the Lion King’s opening song. He’s kind of a bigger person which can make him intimidating, but he has a great smile and kind heart. Mike and Mary are members of the Three Affiliated Nation. They both grew up on their reservation in Mandaree, North Dakota. When I first met Mike he told me that one day he was going to impregnate Mary to strengthen their nation. The Three Affiliated Nation only has 3,000 or so enrolled members. Surprisingly, Mike didn’t know Mary until Haskell, mostly because Mike would wander in and out of Minneapolis. Their nation’s name comes from the joining of three separate tribes (the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara) for survival and economic purposes. The Mandan and Hidatsa share similar customs and languages. The Arikara are completely different. Mary and Mike both say they are mostly Hidatsa and Mandan. Sacagawea was Hidatsa. Mary is proud of her grandma. She learned me how to pronounce her name correctly, Sa-Ca-Ga-Wii-Ya. With Mike’s arrival everyone breathed a sigh of relief and for the rest of the night we walked around comforted with each other’s presence. The boys were sitting on a hill in the dark behind the bathroom. They asked me how I knew so much about the Wakarusa Wetlands. I showed them some report given to me by Dr. Haines and told them about the different positions I held in the Wetlands Preservation Organization, a Haskell club dedicated to saving the wetlands. I was President in 2009 and Vice President the year leading up to the Trail of Broken Promises. I told them about the different community events I did and all the different people I met through my medicine wheel tours. I said if they ever wanted to learn I was more than willing to educate them. I reassured them that on our journey we would learn more about the Wakarusa Wetlands than we could even imagine, but to remember our journey was to raise awareness about the construction of the freeway that would destroy them. We set up our tents. Trey didn’t have one so I shared mine. Julia, Shireen, Mary, and Willie all slept in the big tent I had purchased a month before. Moey was back in his one person tent. Jackson and Chad shared Jackson’s tent. Mark moved in to Crisco’s excessively huge tent, in a very non-homosexual way. Issac had his own tent to snuggle up in and so did Wayne. Mike slept in his car, and that is how it was for the next few weeks. We went to bed knowing the next day would be the first day we would be walking on the Trail of Death. It was hard to believe we were ending our second day on the road. At this time we had exactly 13 people, 3 cars, 1 dog, and a single message, “Save it, don’t pave it!”