A Ho-Chunk with Dakota ancestry Musings
I have been asked to submit an article for the Mankato Free Press. Mankato, hmm, I must think. When I think of Mankato, though I have been to the Dakota 38 ride event in December, and to its recent powwows, what I most remember is the first time I went to Mankato was the first inter-tribal powwow that was held there in the 70s’, maybe a little earlier. Such is the memory of a child.
I lived with my grandparents, Henry and Marie Decorah. Henry or Choka, was a full-blood Ho-Chunk from Portage, Wisconsin and Marie Crow, was a full-blood Dakota from Santee, South Dakota. I attended many powwows with my grandparents. They were usually held on the reservations in Minnesota, Iowa, South Dakota, or near villages in Wisconsin, but the Mankato Powwow that year was the first powwow held in Mankato since the mass hanging of the Dakota 38, plus 2 (though some feel there was one or two Ho-Chunks hung in this heroic group of men and boys).
My grandmother was especially excited for this powwow. I remember comments like, “It will be good for us to be there” and “It is going to be a special powwow and I want to be there.” My grandfather was afraid of what the community might think, afterall there was that sign that still hung in the city. What sign? I clearly remember that I didn’t understand what they were talking about, but I did understand that whatever they were talking about was serious, and I kept quiet and listened as we prepared to go to Mankato.
The powwow was, as I recall, was held in a ball field. We camped in a tent near other families that we knew, mostly from St. Paul. The surroundings were not familiar to me. I had planned to dance fancy shawl, much to the dismay of my grandparents, but they supported me nonetheless. A lost art of Indian parenting from the greatest generation, assimilation and all. My Gram helped me to get ready. My Choka put our chairs near the arena. All seemed to go on as any other powwow we attended.
There were Dakota and Ho-Chunk people there. Famlies that I knew who loved to dance and get together. While we were dancing, the emcee, I don’t remember his name, said that there were eagles overhead. Emcees announced many things, but this did not seem unusual. The drumming and dancing continued. Soon he said that there were several eagles overhead and urged us to look up. I did. I saw the eagles flying right over the arena. We all kept dancing, but a swell of voices could be heard over the singing.
Soon the emcee started to count the eagles that flew over the dancing arena. I remember he said, “...eleven, twelve” and then “twenty” and his voice cracked when he said, “thirty-one, thirty-two...” Suddenly the drumming and dancing stopped. The emcee, choking back tears, said, “There is one eagle for every man who was hung here in Mankato.” I looked up and saw a large number of eagles flying right over the dancing arena.
Though I was a child, I knew that there was something special happening. The emcee was crying, not something you see very often from a Dakota man or any Indian man. I looked toward where my Gram was sitting, and she was crying. I ran over to her and put my arms around her shoulder. I asked her why she was crying. She told me to look up and see what was going on and listen to the emcee.
Soon after the eagles started to separate and fly away.
This is my memory of this day. I don’t remember what the arena director said or what my grandparents said after this incident. I do remember how I felt after we resumed dancing, I felt proud. I felt that I had been a part of something very sacred and that I should remember what I had seen.
Much time has passed and I am no longer a child. I know my Dakota and Ho-chunk history. I have been angry about broken dubious treaties, evil bounties and discrimination. I have been saddened by health and educational disparities, alcoholism and suicide. When I find it hard to continue I think about my grandparents. I start to remember how much courage it took for them to simply live their lives after undergoing removals, genocidal tactics, assimilation, and relocation.
I now know just how much attending that powwow in Mankato meant to my Gram. I better understand the significance of the eagles flying overhead the dancing arena. It was a sign from the Creator, from our ancestors to keep going and never forget.
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