Friday, September 16, 2011

Just Another Broken Promise...!


It's a shame that the history of our great country is filled with broken promises, especially to the native Americans!

It's no wonder that we were hated by the native Americans for so long, considering our abysmal track record of keeping our word about the treaties and rights for the Indians.

Sep 16, 1893:

Settlers race to claim land


On this day in 1893, the largest land run in history begins with more than 100,000 people pouring into the Cherokee Strip of Oklahoma to claim valuable land that had once belonged to Native Americans. With a single shot from a pistol the mad dash began, and land-hungry pioneers on horseback and in carriages raced forward to stake their claims to the best acres.

Ironically, not many years before that same land had once been considered worthless desert. Early explorers of Oklahoma believed that the territory was too arid and treeless for white settlement, but several suggested it might be the perfect place to resettle Indians, whose rich and fertile lands in the southeast were increasingly coveted by Americans. The U.S. government later took this advice and began removing eastern Indian tribes like the Cherokee and Choctaw to Oklahoma Territory in 1817. No more eager than the whites to leave their green and well-watered lands for the arid plains, some Indians resisted and had to be removed by force-most tragically, the 4,000 Cherokee who died during the brutal overland march known appropriately as the "Trail of Tears."

By 1885, a diverse mixture of Native American tribes had been pushed onto reservations in eastern Oklahoma and promised that the land would be theirs "as long as the grass grows and the water runs." Yet even this seemingly marginal land did not long escape the attention of land-hungry Americans. By the late nineteenth century, farmers had developed new methods that suddenly made the formerly reviled Plains hugely valuable. Pressure steadily increased to open the Indian lands to settlement, and in 1889, President Benjamin Harrison succumbed and threw open large areas of unoccupied Indian lands to white settlement. The giant Cherokee Strip rush was only the largest of a series of massive "land runs" that began in the 1890s, with thousands of immigrants stampeding into Oklahoma Territory and establishing towns like Norman and Oklahoma City almost overnight.

Wouldn't it be really nice for a change to have a government that would stop making promises that it had no intentions of ever keeping? That is something we will probably never know, at least not in my lifetime!

That's a real shame! It really is!

Time for some fresh coffee on the patio. Want to play under the sprinkler this morning? Probably our only chance for relief from the heat!

15 comments:

Gorges Smythe said...

Corruption is the very nature of government, that's why guys like Jefferson didn't want us to have too much of it.

Caddie said...

wouldn't it be nice if people weren't so greedy and heartless? This stain will remain upon the soul of us all, the ancestors. When one takes, another loses. Such is the case today with the many home losses and innumerable other situations.

Dizzy-Dick said...

I know a wonderful lady who's ancesters were on that march, the trail of tears. It is appearant that some of them survived.

Momlady said...

I live where it started.

SHARON said...

The way the 'white man' of this country has treated the Native Americans and the Black Americans has always been appauling to me. I am a firm believer in 'what goes around, comes around' and, I don't want to be around when its payback time.

linda m said...

I agree with Sharon; I don't want to be around when it is "payback time". Hopefully some time in the future our government will start keeping the promises it makes. I will pass on playing in your sprinkler; it is cold here in WI.

Mechanic in Illinois said...

We're already getting payback, our Muslim president is seeing to that. Thanks for the neat story and have a great Friday.

HermitJim said...

Hey Gorges...
I think that Jefferson and the rest must have had an insight into what big government could and would become.

We should have paid more attention!

Thanks for the visit this morning!


Hey Sissy...
True that we will carry some of the stain of our forefathers, but let's just hope we don't continue to make some of the same mistakes in judgement that they did!

Learn from the past or repeat it!

Thanks for coming by today!


Hey DD...
One can only imagine what a terrible ordeal it was! Shameful!

This is just a portion of our history we would like to ignore, but shouldn't.

Thanks for coming over today!


Hey Momlady...
Lots of history up in your neck of the woods, isn't there?

I would love to go through some of the museums in that area someday!

Thanks for dropping by today!


Hey Sharon...
I think you are correct about payback being a b***h!

Won't be pleasant, that's for sure!

I appreciate the visit this morning!


Hey Linda...
Cold? I think I can remember the weather being cold!

It was so long ago, it seems like a half-forgotten dream! Same with the rain!

OK...no sprinkler time for you then! Just hot coffee!

Thanks for coming by today!


Hey Mechanic...
Does seem as though things are a tad out of control in DC, doesn't it?

The political world seems to have gone crazy!

Hey, thanks for coming by today!

JoJo said...

I will always feel for the American Indian. To many ugly stories, I have the book Trail Of Tears and have been trying to read it for 2 summers now. I just can't finish the book because it is so sad.

Running thru the sprinklers sounds like fun.

Judy said...

It would be interesting from the anthropological point of view to know why the Caucasian race, specifically, the English, operate this way.

Ben in Texas said...

About that land rush. One of my Daddy's relatives made that run and the sod house he built is still there.
OK Sod house
I have been in it twice. I was in that house back in the 1950's when the family went up to visit Daddy's family that still lived in the area. Some great Uncle was still living in it at the time. Years later on business one time I drove out to it and when the lady running it found out who I was, it was like ole home week. We were cousins of some sort or the other.

TROUBLEnTX said...

Sure liked this, struck a chord.

Sixbears said...

We are all Native Americans now. The government breaks trust with all of us.

HermitJim said...

Hey JoJo...
They had some tough times at the hands of the government, I'm afraid.

You should finish the book. Lots of history there!

Thanks, sweetie, for dropping by today!


Hey Judy...
It would be interesting to know, wouldn't it?

Hey, I really appreciate the visit.


Hey Ben...
Pretty cool to see one of those old houses and know that some relatives were living there!

Nice to have someone that knows their history in an area.

Thanks, buddy, for coming by today!


Hey Trouble...
Glad you liked it, my friend.

Thanks for coming over.


Hey Sixbears...
That is certainly a fact! Happening more and more every day!

Thanks for dropping in , buddy!

Mayberry said...

What Sixbears said...