Maybe I should make a category for “What are we becoming? Yeah, well, where have we been?”
Trail of Tears may grow by 2,000 miles if study OK’d
By RICHARD POWELSON, powelsonr@shns.com
February 17, 2006WASHINGTON – The National Park Service on Thursday endorsed a study that may add about 2,000 miles of land and water routes to the current Trail of Tears National Historic Trail through eastern Tennessee and portions of eight other states.
About 16,000 Cherokee Indians, mostly from homes in Tennessee, North Carolina and Georgia, were forced from their homes in the winter of 1838-39 and required to walk about 800 miles to designated Indian Territory in what now is Oklahoma.
About 2,200 miles of their known land and water routes already are designated as a national historic trail. But historians and other experts have identified roughly 2,000 miles of other routes taken by Cherokees and suggest that those areas be included in the historic Trail of Tears.
More than 4,000 American Indians, primarily the elderly, frail and young, died during the trip in harsh conditions.
“The Department (of the Interior) recognizes the importance of telling the complete story of the Trail of Tears,” John Parsons, associate regional director of the Park Service, told the Senate Subcommittee on National Parks.
Chief Chadwick Smith of The Cherokee Nation said he welcomed the progress on the legislation.
Smith told the subcommittee that the march was “one of the darkest chapters of American history.”
Adding federal markers to all the trails and routes and showing them on maps will help educate new generations of the lessons of early American history involving Native Americans, Smith said.
“The United States government must not repeat the mistakes it made in the past,” he said. “It must honor its word and forever remember the inspiring story of the Cherokee spirit. At stake is the integrity of the United States and its word.”
The study, if approved by Congress, would cost about $175,000, the Park Service estimated. If the Park Service recommends adding the extra land and water routes, it would cost about $300,000 extra per year to manage the new area, Parsons said.
At the hearing, Smith unfurled a 10-foot-long, 3-foot-wide banner that was a copy of the original one signed by 17,000 Cherokees to protest their planned relocation from ancestral lands in the East to the Midwest.
Smith said part of the federal reason for the relocation likely was the discovery of gold on Indian land in Georgia.
The study is required in bills supported by Tennessee Sens. Bill Frist and Lamar Alexander, both Republicans, and U.S. Republican Reps. Zach Wamp of Chattanooga, John J. Duncan Jr. of Knoxville, and Democrats Lincoln Davis of Pall Mall, Harold Ford Jr. of Memphis and John Tanner of Union City.
Smith said one history lesson from the Trail of Tears march is: “The greed of individuals and the power of our U.S. government should never be used as instruments to defraud and rob a people of their homeland and government.”
Houoghton Mifflin gives the following:
The Choctaws were the first to be removed. In October 1831 approximately four thousand Choctaws started on foot, by wagon, or on horseback, then by steamboat, and finally overland to Oklahoma. The migration took place during the winter over snow-covered trails. Shelter was inadequate. Food was scarce. The Choctaws moved westward in groups of between five hundred and two thousand. Hundreds died. Entire families, and in some instances whole communities, perished of disease, exposure, exhaustion, and accidents. It was from the Choctaws’ experience that the name Trail of Tears was derived. A second mass removal took place in 1832, and another in 1833.
The Muskogee or Creek Nation followed the Choctaws, but not as peacefully. Following the signing of the Muskogee removal treaty in 1832, conservative factions of the tribe refused to leave their homeland. The result was the Creek War of 1836—37. Under the command of Winfield Scott, the American army captured more than fourteen thousand five hundred Creeks and marched them overland to Oklahoma. Two thousand five hundred made the trip in chains. No accurate count was made, but many died during the trip, and thirty-two hundred died of exposure and disease after their arrival.
The Chickasaws probably had the easiest removal. There were fewer tribal members, and better preparations were made for the trip. Nonetheless, they suffered. Observers were horrified as the Chickasaws marched past, and one remarked, “Money cannot compensate for the loss of what I have seen.” Five hundred died of smallpox alone.
The Cherokees suffered the most. Supporters of the removal, numbering about two thousand, moved west between 1835 and 1838 in relative ease, but about fourteen thousand others opposed removal. Georgia militia invaded the Cherokee Nation, destroying crops, burning homes, and scattering families. To control the militia and bring order to the removal process, federal troops rounded up the remaining Cherokees and herded them into concentration camps. Disease spread rapidly. Many died, and others were sick when they started westward in 1838. Eventually one-quarter of the tribe perished.
Deceived by government agents into signing a removal treaty, the Seminoles fought when federal authorities insisted they honor the fraudulent treaty. The result was the Second Seminole War. Fighting started in 1835 as the U.S. Army moved into Florida to remove the Seminoles. The last band of Seminoles were forced westward in chains in February 1859.
How lax can I be, referring to Houghton Mifflin. Right?
Yeah, I know, I’m a cranky old bitch, blogging on historical tidbits entirely irrelevant to present events. Right?
Hitler studied how America handled its indigenous population and thought America did a rip-roaring enough job he ought to emulate it.
The following is occasionally passed around in warning of oppression:
“When they came for the Jews I did nothing. When they came for the Slavs I did nothing. When they came for the Gypsies I did nothing. When they came for the handicapped I did nothing. When they came for the communists I did nothing. When they came for the homosexuals I did nothing. When they came for me there was no-one left to help me.”
So how come America doesn’t point to its own history? Why is it ignored and counted as ancient past? “Pay no attention to the forced removals and starvation on the reserves. That’s back in America’s dark ages! And it paved the way for democracy!” Close curtain.
Yeah, “Paving the way for democracy!” That’s what I ought to call the new category.
Make way! Highway coming through!
I know, I couldn’t be any more irrelevant.
I’m pretty pissed over the fact no one could be bothered to comment on the 1900 Otoe Noble County census. Hey, but I’d be just as pissed off if someone posted a Hallmark Greeting Card sentiment. I know I shouldn’t be pissed off. I should be cordial about it all. The nice thing is to be cordial about it all. I shouldn’t take it personally, and I don’t. But it does drive me sometimes seriously over the edge when I read, “What are we becoming?” and “Where have we been?” is expected to stand in the corner with a smile and a sign reading, “Here I am but don’t mind me! Things are totally all right since I got electricity! Give me a laptop and we’re completely square!” I’m a pissed off person. I was pissed off when I was 17. I’m 48 and even more pissed off. Maybe I should become the crazy old broad of the blogosphere, seeking down every instance of “What are we becoming?” and posting links to “Gee, I don’t know! Couldn’t possibly be More of the Same!”
Hey, yet another name for the new category? Which should I choose? “Yeah, well, where have we been?” “Couldn’t possibly be more of the same!” “Paving the way for democracy!”
“Put a fork in me! I’m done!” Obviously, I’m not there yet. Sorry.
When it comes down to it though, I don’t want any comments on this. Not a single god-damn one. I just want people to remember. And I mean really, really remember. Deep down in their bones remember.
I want everyone to go outside in their yard and take up a handful of earth and smell it and remember.
When you’re driving the interstate to work, look out over the landscape and remember.
Just a short 120 years ago, things were very different here. Just a short 140, 150, 180 years ago, things were very different here. “To the winner go the spoils” is America’s mantra concerning what it has done to indigenous populations. One nail’s flick beneath the “Oh, we’re so sorry, we’ll do better next time” gloss is an abiding “to the winner go the spoils, deal with it, sweetie” heart. Even if this blunt reality was admitted, then there’d be some honest ground upon which to stand and take a look at the future.
As Emerson said, Americans lost this country a long time ago. Lost it. Abandoned it when they stole it. Pick up the earth in your yard and think about it. A nation of homeless people.
A nation of homeless people.
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