Crazy George speaks from his heart
Dear Webmaster,
I like to say a few words from my heart, Some people won't like it - I ask if I am wrong? We know that Columbus didn't discover this land, they did not come here to study their religion, they came to take gold and silver. That wasn't good enough so they stole our ancestors' land.
Their constitution said all people are created equal. That is another lie. I don't hate the white man cause the creators don't want that. I just hate his way and I don't trust them. You think they changed when their ancestors came here.
The white man wants all N.A.I. to fight amongst ourselves so we can't get nothing done. Look at the Blacks, they stuck together and they got better house and apartments, jobs, what has the native American Indian gotten?
They want you to control the rez like they want. They dont want to help cause thats their choice. The government is for themselves. One thing they can not take away is me being Indian.
I am Kentucky Cherokee and I am proud. I dance my own dances, I am a single tree in the forest. Thank you for your time. Hope all tribes of N.A.I. had a great Christmas and New Years.
Crazy George
Versaillies, Kentucky
ROOTED IN HISTORY: LOCAL MAN DISCOVERS SENSE OF SELF
Bernard Humbles-Penn of Bell Acres is challenged everyday by his reflection in the mirror. In three dimensions, he stands 5 feet 10 inches and 200 pounds at 65 years of age. His shape is imposing; his style, dignified. His image shows a Black man with skin a "reddish dark brown," as he describes it. But he is a Native American. A Cherokee, in fact. Fifteen years ago he traveled to Virginia to learn his family's history from his cousin, Walter Empy. "' If you want to know, my mother said, go to Covington, Va.,' " he remembers. He planned a pleasant reunion, but he had no hing of what he would find. The verbal history he heard on that visit provoked his interest, and he began intensive research of his hidden heritage. "I'm three-quarters Indian, one-eighth White and one-eighth Black," he states.
Humbles-Penn found information in the Jones Library in Lynchburg, Va. He reviewed national and state census documents, walked through cemeteries and studied government treaties with Indian tribes. He foound his roots in a central Virginia county, in a place called Buffalo Ridge. "The Penns were never salves," he explains. As a dark-skinned people when the nation's first census was taken in 1790, his ancestors wsere categorized as "mulatoos," a designation for those who were neither White or Black.
An earlier Virginia state law of 1705 also required that "Indians" be classified as "mulatto." Had the census-takers called them "Indian," the people may have been entitled to land offered as reparations by the early colonial government for land it had taken from them. In fact, some extended family members were reluctant to find yet another relative in him, one who might want to share in the 6,000 acres once granted to the Penns of Virginia for Revolutionary War service.
"Raleigh Penn, a great-great-great-great-grandfather, was a light-skinned mulatto and listed on the first census," Humbles-Penn remarks. Humbles-Penn's skin is dark; a grand-daugher's complexion is White; two other grand-children have distinctly Indian features. He illustrates with the children's school pictures: Side-by-side the photos capture the history of indigenous peoples and their involvement with colonizing strangers.
The Cherokee Nation once possessed a 135,000 square mile territory that covered eight states here in the East. Dr. Horace Rice records their history in a book titled "The Buffalo Ridge Cherokee; The Colors and Culture of a Virginian Indian Community." Humbles-Penn contributed to this text and others. Within Rice's pages, the history of these Native Americans is traced: "The Indian tribes in Virginia were reduced to one-third of their population between 1609 and 1669, as a result of spirituous liquors, war, the small pox and possession by whites of part of Indian territory." Other reduction occurred because of a "amalgamation of the red and black slaves." Intermarriage mingled the races. "Since the Indians were generally in the minority," Rice continues, "as well as inferior in power of resistance, their physical characteristics gradualy disappeared, while those of the Negro remained."
As Humbles-Penn describes it, "The people are all over the place - they are White and Indian; Black and Indian; Indian; Indian, Black and White." He explains that when Columbus discovered America, the Indians here were darker-skinned, as dark as the people from India today. The Spanish came, then the English and the African slaves. And the mix began. "People keep looking for an acceptable color level," he comments with a touch of sarcasm.
His research into his own family tree, which includes the Bollings - a family both White and Indian - who were related to Pocahontas, has led him to found the United Cherokee Indian Tribe of West Virginia. He is the 400-member group's principal chief. As a Cherokee, one of the five civilized bribes of America, Humbles-Penn is clear about the plight of this country's first people who were "destroyed on paper." For Humbles-Penn, this exclusion on the census forms, just adds to the injustice of taking Indian land and the destruction of their cluture. "When you do that, when you take the land and culture away," the chief says, "the people are nothing."
A forced exodus of the Indians from Virginia and other Eastern states was ordered by the federal government in 1838. Many died as they marched to Oklahoma reservations on the infamous Trail of Tears.
A remnant of the Cherokee hid in the mountains and lived in settlements around Buffalo Ridge or escaped on route to the West and settled in. Humbles-Penn works to help West Virginia families and others discover their ancestry. "Many Blacks," he says, "are not aware they might have Indian blood."
With the instituion of special federal programs specific to Native Americans, this trace of heritage can be valuable. The discovery of Indian ancestry is "something that brings people together and something that sets them apart," he cautions. Mixed blood can be a mixed blessing; one drop of Black or Indian blood is potent enough to determine a label that lasts a lifetime. "I'm satisfied in finding out who and what I am," he says, fingering a beaded medallion he sometimes wears. Its colors are red, black and white, the sign of this man, in a circular pattern. "I'm a friendly Indian," he adds with a laugh. As he gives his talks before college and history groups, his only purpose is "to tell the truth of what was destroyed." Chief Bernard Humble-Penn is a man of many words when it comes to sharing the story of his people - if you've got the hours to spend and an interest in learning. "As for prejudice," he affirms, "I have no time for it."
Chief Bernard Humbles-Penn
Copied out of The Sewickley Hearld:Wednesday, November 29, 1995-Page 13
My Heritage
Are you of Italian Descent? or Britian? or Ireland maybe? Maybe you are from one of the African nations. How about Australia? or Germany? No matter. Your nationality, the US Government believes you and will accept your word for it. Right? WRONG!!! Except one Nationality. If you are Native American your word is not worth SQUAT. You must prove it, But how? The US Government destroyed not only our people but also our Names, which makes it near impossible to prove any claim in writing. We do have our forefathers word for our ancestry which the government rarely accepts.
There are 319 FEDERALLY RECOGNIZED TRIBES -- 200 TRIBES EXTINCT -- 30 STATE RECOGNIZED TRIBES.
WE ARE INDIAN AND PROUD PEOPLE.
They made us many Promises,
But they kept only one Promise.
They promised to take our Land and they Took IT.
Red Cloud
Dakota