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Odds and Ends => Etcetera => Topic started by: Epiphany on February 28, 2013, 03:57:01 pm

Title: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: Epiphany on February 28, 2013, 03:57:01 pm
My grandpa did indeed say he had NDN heritage. And he was so genial and charming when he said these and other things, so he must be right. Right? Wrong.

His people were from South Dakota. Most everyone from South Dakota are NDNs. Right? Wrong, his people were white homesteaders, originally from Quebec.

Quebec! Oh, French Canadian! Almost all of them had NDN ancestry, right? Wrong. They weren't French Canadian, they were Loyalists. And all French Canadian do not have NDN ancestry.

Now we're back over the pond, some of our ancestors lived places where there were castles in the area. We must be Royal, right? Wrong. Proximity doesn't equal heritage.

Turns out my grandpa was a confabulist, he made up false stories about our heritage, about his military service, and other things.

When I work on our actual family genealogy I have to keep in mind:

*Lots of incorrect information and family trees out there. Just because a particular bit of info or family tree is repeated everywhere on line does not mean it is correct. Records on ancestry.com and familysearch.org can be helpful, but we all have to pay attention to source.

*When I don't know, I admit that I don't know. I keep reading and researching, I don't state that my guesses are fact. I'm willing to discard any guesses that are wrong.

*I don't try to force our genealogy into any one direction, I don't try to prove we are NDN or anything else. Because if I do I'll only see what I want to see, I'll select info that I think proves my belief.

Doing the real work of genealogy is fascinating. I encourage everyone who doesn't know their heritage to find out. We might not discover anything that we can then package as NDN heritage & use to promote ourselves as extra special and spiritual - but why on earth would we want to do that in the first place?



Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on March 01, 2013, 06:09:42 pm
I do genealogy all the time of my Lakota and Dakota people and it is an adventure,
I get many request for people claiming Indian blood.
Of course many are just not true.
One question i get my great great great grandma was named Mary Anderson (just a fake name) and she
belong to the sioux tribe.
I first question is which band and which reservations because we have 14 reservation and nine Canadian province of our nations?
What was her real name?
The Lakota and Dakota people did not take english first an last names until 1890 to 1900 so they just
had their Native Names and they were all in either Lakota or Dakota.
Then I ask for a date because in our part of the country first contact with non natives was 1870s before
that it was only soldiers.
We dont have surnames so at the time of Sitting Bull there was also six other Sitting Bull but not related to us and our people.
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on March 01, 2013, 06:24:57 pm
At least once a week i get I am a decendant of Sitting Bull request.
People seem shocked that the tribe keep srecord of all our people
and know who is related to who and how. I can trufully say of all the request
i get for Sitting Bull none are correct because his relatives are all here
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: Epiphany on March 02, 2013, 01:57:13 am
Earth I really appreciate learning about your work

Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on March 02, 2013, 02:33:07 am
Native genealogy is different than your standard genealogy because of the language and family structures
the wives and how children relate to people, not having surnames and first names, then
the changing of names as you age,
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: Epiphany on March 02, 2013, 03:42:17 am
Native genealogy is different than your standard genealogy because of the language and family structures
the wives and how children relate to people, not having surnames and first names, then
the changing of names as you age,

Seems like non NDNs assuming that all Native genealogy = standard genealogy is a lot like non NDNs assuming that everything, including cultures and traditions and ceremonies, are all ultimately the same.  As if everything is pretty much the same and that everyone can have everything.




Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on March 02, 2013, 05:12:28 pm
I know i get people who send me request saying my great great great grandmother born 1780
Sarah Brown was from the indian reservation in South Dakota and was a full blood sioux.
I have to laugh because there was no reservations in 1780 let alone a sioux reservation
then no one had english names until 1900 and no one had last names and no one spoke
english. Plus there are no sioux people everyone is divided into the nations and bands at that time,
Then people have our people in many other states which did not happen
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: critter - a white non-ndn person on March 03, 2013, 01:56:39 am
earthw7, you words are so valuable. If only people would listen.
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: Epiphany on March 19, 2013, 11:25:56 pm
She's identified as  "Sowege (Shawnee Indian) Gliding Swan", "Mary Elizabeth" and  "Shawnee Indian Princess" in family trees. Some of the info out there might be correct but my guess is that lots and lots of it is incorrect. Back in the mid 1700s she and John Cassell had several children in Pennsylvania and Virginia.

Any guesses are repeated all over the web, such as:

Quote
Therefore it is fairly safe to assume that Sowege is a name that identifies some effeminate nature of behavior of a swan.

Don Greene's book Shawnee Heritage lists her, but he doesn't include sources. In the intro to his book he says he didn't feel like including sources, too much work, too costly in terms of printing costs, and that he is free of "academic restraints".

From his bio:

Quote
Using his prodigious memory, years of research, much intuitive thought and maybe a little apparently psychic ability Don has pieced together the trails of many families among the Shawnee and the part-white Shawnee Metis as well as gaining a new understanding of the role the Shawnee played in the true history of the United States from the earliest arrival of the Europeans until the sad times of the removal of the Native Americans to the west and beyond that into current times.

Don maintains contacts with most of the Shawnee Bands in several States and has conversed with the Tribes in Oklahoma as well. His work is currently being used by many groups and families. Don is assisting with a Shawnee Homecoming in Ohio in conjuncture with some of the Bands from that State, with hopes of seeing a Shawnee Congress developed, consisting of delegates from all Shawnee Bands and Shawnee-derivative groups, to work on many things of concern to the descendants of the Shawnee.

A thought foremost in Don's mind at the moment is to establish once and for all that the Shawnee were the predominant Native culture at the arrival of the whites on this continent and suffered the most from the spread of their diseases. Two subjects that Don continues to work on through what he calls his Great Work are the Shawnee Diaspora, the dispersal of the Shawnee throughout America and the Great Shawnee Denial, in which the Shawnee began denying who they truly were and claiming to be anything but a Shawnee.

http://www.history-epublications.com/DonGreene/DonGreene.html (http://www.history-epublications.com/DonGreene/DonGreene.html)

So, for people who may have Jacob Cassell/Castle and Sowege as ancestors, I think it is important to not automatically trust and pass on the prolific misinformation that is online and possibly in Don Greene's work. Frequent repetition online doesn't make things true.

Most likely some people have kept close to Sowege's heritage and know her and their story to this day, this information most likely will not be found online, even through records and unsourced family trees available on sites like ancestry.com.



Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on March 20, 2013, 12:50:39 am
Metis is not Shawnee, and so many people think they can claim to be shawnee and we would not know :o
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: Epiphany on March 20, 2013, 01:16:13 am
Metis is not Shawnee, and so many people think they can claim to be shawnee and we would not know :o

So much wrong information out there.

More on Don Greene, the author of the Shawnee Heritage book:

Quote
Chief Don Spirit Wolf
now proudly serving as Principal Chief of the Appalachian Shawnee Tribe

http://chowanoke.webs.com/apps/profile/73156974/ (http://chowanoke.webs.com/apps/profile/73156974/)

He's also a member of http://chickamaugacherokee.org/confederacy1/ (http://chickamaugacherokee.org/confederacy1/) & has gone by "Don Greene-Friend Spirit Wolf-Kahnah Monetoo Mowawa-Chief of the Shawnee Appalachian Band "
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on March 20, 2013, 06:47:45 pm
Today everyone makes up tribes  ???
Of course they have give themselves these so called INDIAN names
and then make themsleves chiefs it is almost too funny but it comes to
a point where it wants to make you cry! :'( Why! being who we are is hard
life on the rez is not easy so it surprises me why people would want to be
something there not .... OH WAIT it is not who we are that they want to be
it is some sort of fake image of a people that only exist in their minds.

My pet peeve: When non-Indians are more Native than us
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: BlueTick on March 25, 2013, 11:28:23 pm
Hello..I am new here, I seen the post "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" . It was hard to walk on by. I have heard many a people
say the same or close . Tracing your family history back through time is a hard if not impossible task for many. I know where I come from, alot records were distroyed during the Civil war.

I think alot of times people don't think about the whole of the picture, only the part they think they like. I don't know too many people who would want to live in a shack in the mountains, no indoor water or bathroom and eat beans everyday.

Guess I really don't have much to say....it just kinda makes me go silent , no tongue

Thank you for the post, it took me back in time.

Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on March 26, 2013, 12:58:37 am
sounds like the reservation today we live in shakes, no indoor water or bathroom and just ate beans today lol
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: milehighsalute on April 01, 2013, 04:59:46 pm
why is it that so many people claim that records were destroyed in fire......can they change the story for variety already? JUST ONCE PLEASE someone tell me that the documents containing proof of their indian ancestory was destroyed in a flood...PRETTY PLEASE

oh....and we get to hear about high cheekbones and how they never burn in the summer  ::)

family lore is just that....family lore
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: MattOKC on April 02, 2013, 06:23:47 am
The "courthouse burned in a fire" thing is SO common you'd thing there was an epidemic of arson across the known world in the early 1900s. The other explanation is "she [my Cherokee great-grandmother] denied she was Indian because of persecution, so she pretended to be Mexican instead." Nevermind the bald racism or implausibility of this claim, could there be something else going on?

Yes! In fact, it's actually very likely that many peoples' great-grandmothers DID claim to be Cherokee!

When Allotment divided Indian treaty lands into individual homesteads, many whites saw a chance to profit. Since genealogies were less accurate (if kept at all) for women's lineage (because of patriarchal family rights under the law), a scam was concocted to have women claim Cherokee identity in order to "access" (that would be "steal" in today's parlance) Indian allotments. This means two amazing things. First, far from trying to hide being "Cherokee," it became advantageous to contrive such a claim. And second, these sad people who think they have a cool Cherokee ancestor have seriously misunderstood history. They don't have a Cherokee great-grandmother; they more likely have a WHITE great-grandmother who was part of a con to steal land FROM the Cherokees!
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: milehighsalute on April 03, 2013, 03:25:40 pm
not to mention real cherokees have huge family bonds......i cant imagin many cherokee women chasing white men down for marriage....i know it happened but cmon....how many women actually want to lay down with the people who abused them and thier people every night.....oh nevermind thats any modern injun woman...wow now im off-track.....i'll shut up now before i talk myself into a corner
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: Litsehimmel on April 09, 2013, 08:48:10 pm
Hi,

The records about my native ancestor were unfortunately destroyed in a flood, which is pretty common here in The Netherlands *wicked grin*

Seriously though, I am a semi-professional genealogist and working with info from The Netherlands can be just as frustrating and annoying. The times I see faulty information just being copied and pasted by loads of folks on the net are just too numerous to count. As a former research journalist, the one important thing I have learned is that nothing, and I mean nothing should be accepted as truth if it can't be backed by at least one reliable source.

For my own family tree I have spent hours and hours delving through dusty records, just searching for that one clue or registration that will justify any hunch or theory I might have. Even though I have gotten pretty good at making a hypothesis about something, and it usually pans out, I never submit it as truth unless I can back it up.

As for native american ancestry, I presumably (note, I use the word presumably so please stop groaning - smirk) have some myself. As I know the sea faring British male ancestor who married this basically unknown woman just prior to 1800 did reach North Carolina and traveled up an unknown river deep into the 'hinterland', I am cautiously thinking possibly Tsalagi. Then again, it could be Sappony, or Waccamaw-Siouan, or Coharie, or Tuscarora, or ... All my British family knows for sure is that she came from the USA, had long black hair which she 'greased', and 'missed eating corn'. She was called Ann but called herself something like Anja or Anya. No definitive records survived, so it's "just another story".
Interestingly enough, when I married my 1st husband in Asheville, NC - my complicated family history made us want to avoid a stressed marriage, and good friends of ours lived there - we had to fill in forms to apply for the wedding. We had to fill in our race, something that really took us aback as we're not used to that here in The Netherlands. Naturally, we both entered 'caucasian'. My form was not accepted until I strenuously argued that, as we would be going back to The Netherlands and not live in the USA, I would not apply for "US citizenship based on native american ancestry". I was blown away! The registrar at the Asheville Court House had taken one look at me and had known, just known, that I had native ancestry. During our 3 week stay there I often was asked what tribe I was related to. Sadly, I was never able to answer. It still seems strange to me, as my colouring (prior to the dreaded advance of pepper & salt) was basically Celtic: auburn hair and green eyes. But I have to admit that people in The Netherlands often thought I had Indonesian blood. Which I don't.

LH
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on April 10, 2013, 02:16:09 pm
I have heard many story and some of the stories we just can not comfrim because of the time,
There were many people on the east coast who were either taken as slaves or married into non natives
and we never heard from them again. The problem is they were told to forget who they were and to fit in the
white society so the history is lost. There are so many tribe on the east coast that no longer exist over a
thousand tribes that are now extinct we will never know there names. So you may never know who you come from.
The way genealogy works in Indian country is hard
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: Epiphany on April 29, 2013, 02:07:20 am
For anyone doing genealogy, this from Kathryn is important to keep in mind:

Quote
Sadly, it's pretty common for liberals (and exploiters) descended from colonial Indian-killers to try to rewrite their history and give themselves NDN ancestors. But anyone with experience spots this: you'll have a bunch of well-sourced info on the white people, then some alleged NDN with no data, no source documents, and the clincher: a stereotypical name in English. Like "Mourning Dove," or "Rushing Stream," while the only real NDNs in that area at that time have names in the relevant NDN language.

http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?topic=4063.msg34342#msg34342 (http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?topic=4063.msg34342#msg34342)
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: RedTailCoyote on September 27, 2013, 01:12:48 am
Working in a museum, I think if I had a penny for every time someone told me that their grandparent said they're NDN...we'd be able to build a new museum.  Though recently, I've been able to add Catawba, Apache, Creek, Shawnee, and Seminole princesses to the list.

And how you can see their high cheek bones, their longer second toe, shovel teeth, lack of body hair, deformed pallet, skin spots, and growths on their molars.

On a more personal note, when I started work for the museum it caused a HUGE commotion in the family.  We were taught that we were German on my father's side.  Come to find out Grandma is 1/2 Lithuanian and 1/2 something else that was never recorded.  Great Uncle is livid because he's "been trying to get them to register on the tribal rolls for years".  The rest of the family says...well...they don't say anything to me anymore because I just want to know.  The paperwork we do have says Tom and Mary Williams (Canada) No death date...no birth date...no territory.  Then their son born in Port de Luc (or deLucy, duLuc, duLuche, etc...) with no date (can't remember first name). Then he ran with his Lithuanian wife into Pennsylvania.  Where are the records?  Wait for it....town was said to burned down.  Where's the town?  Hell if I can find it!

My time trying to find any kind of information has given me a whole new appreciation for the frustration of all the NDN people who grew up in their traditions, mixed or not, with crazy people trying to claim elaborate heritage.
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on October 27, 2013, 04:12:15 pm
everyday I get someone who writes to me saying that they believe they have Native blood,
some people send me pictures or tell me they have an Indian nose, ears, eyes high cheek bones or whatever,
I do most of their background and find they are from Europe no matter what they think they look like,
Native people are very close family structures, if you dont know your family you are not native,
except in cases of adoption and fostered.
Just in the Lakota-Dakota-Nakota People, it is easy to look if you had a grandparent born before
1850 that has a white name "example" John Smith or Mary more than likely they are not Native,
The first white settler came on the plains in 1850s then it was not a friendly relationship.
The native people did not have first and last names they just had their names and when you
hear the name you can tell where they come from,
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: Coastrangechild on November 20, 2013, 12:38:37 am
My genealogy was hard to sort out. Mostly because my father is schizophrenic and made up all sorts of wild stories about our family, which I believed for a long time, and had to sort them out. No my Grandmother was NOT Annie Oakley, who actually was of a reptilian race from space. Eventually, my aunt traveled throughout the country finding records. And did some online and found some solid information.

According to her research we may have ties to a tribe in the NE - BUT even if it is true it is like my 21st grandmothers side ... and the records are spotty. So to "prove" anything is just a long shot. Really true or not it seems so very disconnected how could I, in good conscience claim to be "Native."

What is funny is that I actually do have high cheek bones and have been asked by MANY white people if I am Indian - which I always thought a very strange question. It is like asking somebody if they are Dutch because they grow tulips, but more ignorant. My aunt found a ton of pictures of our family from Sweden - and our face/cheek bones look VERY similar. In fact I found a picture of one relative from Finland in the 1800's who looks almost exactly like me. It was pretty awesome. So I do see myself in my ancestors but not in the way you are talking about.

And I experience a weird reaction from some when I say I am partially Scandinavian (I have dark features and hair). They generally say, "But you are too dark!"
I told one person it is suspected that I may have some Spanish ancestry, which is true but only a very small part ... they then went on to call me a derogatory term for somebody from Mexico.  People are just dumb. They want everything to be obvious and superficial. I blame it on Nascar. (((Just kidding)))
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: Defend the Sacred on November 26, 2013, 08:22:58 pm
As the Powhatan "Emperors," "Princesses" and "Medicine People" have come up yet again in another thread, copying that post here, as well.

http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?topic=4243.msg36268#msg36268

In various threads on here we've discussed the fabricated Powhatan ancestry issue. When I've referred to fabricated NDNs with fanciful English names, it was exactly this stuff:

"I am 16th Gr. Granddaughter of Elder White Feather and Scent Flower, Iroquois Leadership and Medicine People in 1600's "

What this means is she has white ancestors from the Jamestown colonies.

There are people on Ancestry.com who have merged what few Powhatans for whom we have documentation with any random NDN or suspected NDN they can find from within a hundred years and a thousand miles of where Matoaka et al lived. Those are two of those composite/fabricated people.

The normal NDNs, plus a community leader or two, who all got disrespectfully merged and misappropriated into non-Native's family trees, then turned into "Princesses," "Emperors," and now that it's more fashionable, "Medicine People," were in almost every case just some normal Native who happened to marry a white person. There is no reason to think they were medicine people, especially since they married white people and assimilated hundreds of years ago.

Other researchers and I have also encountered white people who find one woman with no recorded last name who start claiming that must mean she was an NDN. Real genealogists will be laughing your asses off right now, as we know that once you go back far enough, it's sadly the norm that many women never had their maiden names recorded. That's all about patrilineal naming conventions, and has zero to do with ethnicity.

Some of these histories involve white people who were slavers, and I think we should look very critically at claims that these young Native women *chose* to marry old white men. I think the real history for most of these women and girls was probably brutal, not romantic.

----------------------

The same person also claimed "druidic" heritage, because some "Mc" and "O" names turned up in her family trees.  :o

http://www.newagefraud.org/smf/index.php?topic=4243.msg36269#msg36269

The Druids were the educated class of ancient Celtic cultures. "Celtic" is a language grouping, not a blood type, and people don't inherit cultural knowledge via distant ancestry.
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on November 26, 2013, 08:38:00 pm
I just had a call from a women in Ohio who claimed to be the granddaughter of Sitting Bull because her grandfather was the grandson of Sitting Bull, She was 72 years old so i ask how did they get to Ohio and what were they doing in Ohio? Then I asked how does she figure her grandfather was Sitting Bull's grandson. I remind her Sitting Bull died in 1890, with no living sons, at that as she said her grandfather was born in 1845 how could Sitting Bull have a grandson at the age 11 years old!
She told me now what I am going to do I told everyone all my life that I was related to Sitting Bull. I said its time to tell the truth.
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on October 05, 2014, 01:15:07 pm
each week i get a call from someone claiming to be related to Sitting Bull and i wonder
what do these people think this man went around and created thousand of children across the world. >:(
I was talking to one of the relatives of Sitting Bull yesterday about the many people who make their claims
to Sitting Bull which are untrue. He had a small family and the government kept records on him.
My friend called me the dream crusher  because i have to tell people no you are not related
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: koyoteh on October 06, 2014, 11:18:26 pm
wouldn't the cherokee thing be kind of tricky though?

they were one of the first civilized tribes and mixed with white people right away. They even took up owning black slaves , and like the white people had black slave babies.
they began to create their own mixed culture that was very different.

when a white person tells me they are cherokee, i give them the benefit of the doubt that they might be, but i don't necessariily know where they are coming from when they say that knowing that they were slave owners and were some first to voluntarily assimilate.
i admit ignorance of the five civilized tribes. i have barely begun to speak to members of these tribes that began to inform me of their history.

first one that began to inform me a little was a choctaw lady. she reminded me of their history.
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: koyoteh on October 06, 2014, 11:26:25 pm
each week i get a call from someone claiming to be related to Sitting Bull and i wonder
what do these people think this man went around and created thousand of children across the world. >:(
I was talking to one of the relatives of Sitting Bull yesterday about the many people who make their claims
to Sitting Bull which are untrue. He had a small family and the government kept records on him.
My friend called me the dream crusher  because i have to tell people no you are not related

serious question. or maybe am just curious.

what if you do run into some descendant, that was related way way down the line. Does there relationship have any kind of status?

i wouldn't think so. but maybe they are after money or something?
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on October 07, 2014, 02:44:44 pm
well we have many people who have descendant of the tribes, but are not member nor they can claim
relatives unless they know thier family-being Native means family.
A person can not say i am native and not know their families
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: cowichan on October 14, 2014, 12:27:22 am
Earthw7 says you canot say I am native and not know your family. In the sense that you cannot claim indian upbringing without knowing your family name (and tribe and totem etc) but you can certainly be of indian blood and know none of that. My wife's mother was adopted. She managed to obtain her mother's birth certificate. Father anglo name, mother Cree name, nationality listed as native. My wife had done enough research to think she was from the White Earth reserve. For years we would attend Sundance ceremony in N Dakota and spend the weeks after or before trying to find a roll with the mother's name on it. Without success. I would not have missed it for the world. After going as far as we could checking the paper trail, we would visit the elders to see if they remembered the name. Always a dead end but always the story of those who left this reserve and moved to that reserve or " you should talk to Joe X on another reserve. We drank endless cups of tea and spent hours talking to the most wonderful old folks you could hope to meet. However cold and challenging the officialdom was, the elders always threw open the door and in short order made us feel family. My wife finally gave up the search, too painful to get her hopes up and then crushed when the trail turned cold again. At best she is 1/4 blood but doesn't appear to have a drop of white in her. Which means she has suffered from the racism all natives are subject to without the support of tribe.
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: earthw7 on October 14, 2014, 02:21:59 pm
Yes we have many who were adopted out it depends on the tribe in how they handle the adoptions here
on my reservation we enrolled the children before they are adopted out. If they were adopted before 1959
some of them are lost, We have a long history of forced adoption with the tribes and many end up with a cold trail.
When we meet the people we can tell who belongs to us. So White Earth is a Chippewa reservation do you know why
a Cree Woman was living there? Just asking questions?
Do you have her name is Cree?
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: ShadowDancer on November 04, 2014, 02:32:37 am
I came across this article today in The Guardian regarding Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com/)

Millions of Native American records added to genealogy website  (http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/nov/03/millions-native-american-records-genealogy-website)

Quote
The new data set of 3.2m records contains:

– Oklahoma and Indian Territory, Dawes Census Cards for Five Civilized Tribes, 1898-1914.

– Oklahoma and Indian Territory, Indian Censuses and Rolls, 1851-1959.

– Ratified Indian Treaties and Chiefs, 1722-1869.

– Oklahoma, Indian Land Allotment Sales, 1908-1927.

– Records Related to Enrollment of Eastern Cherokee by Guion Miller, 1908-1910.

Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: Epiphany on November 05, 2014, 08:35:04 pm
Earthw7 says you canot say I am native and not know your family. In the sense that you cannot claim indian upbringing without knowing your family name (and tribe and totem etc) but you can certainly be of indian blood and know none of that. My wife's mother was adopted. She managed to obtain her mother's birth certificate. Father anglo name, mother Cree name, nationality listed as native. My wife had done enough research to think she was from the White Earth reserve. For years we would attend Sundance ceremony in N Dakota and spend the weeks after or before trying to find a roll with the mother's name on it. Without success. I would not have missed it for the world. After going as far as we could checking the paper trail, we would visit the elders to see if they remembered the name. Always a dead end but always the story of those who left this reserve and moved to that reserve or " you should talk to Joe X on another reserve. We drank endless cups of tea and spent hours talking to the most wonderful old folks you could hope to meet. However cold and challenging the officialdom was, the elders always threw open the door and in short order made us feel family. My wife finally gave up the search, too painful to get her hopes up and then crushed when the trail turned cold again. At best she is 1/4 blood but doesn't appear to have a drop of white in her. Which means she has suffered from the racism all natives are subject to without the support of tribe.

I bolded the section I am responding to. Does your wife's mother's birth certificate give adopted information, or is it original? If it lists her birth parents, with that she can look for them in census. An excellent free records search is: https://familysearch.org/search (https://familysearch.org/search) She likely can find her people there and then work methodically back in time, through records. I'd be willing to help with online searches, just let me know. Full names and birth years, locations where people lived, can be a great start.

Maybe you've already done this, but just in case, I want to suggest doing the research work step by step, gathering all the records you can find. Then once you know for sure that there are Native ancestors, once you know their names and family details, then the relevant tribe can be looked to, along with the relevant rolls.
Title: Re: "But my grandpa said he's Indian!" Adventures in Genealogy
Post by: Sandy S on October 22, 2015, 03:56:26 am
My own family history claims Jacob Castle and Sowege as ancestors (via their son Joseph), but after being educated by this Forum I can only regard this data as legend.