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STACEY THUNDER (VOICEOVER): On this edition of Native Report,
we visit the Tantaquidgeon Indian Museum
in Uncasville, Connecticut.
We learn the history of the North American Indian Center
of Boston.
And we celebrate the life of the late Charlie Hill.
(CHANTING) Hi, how are you?
Hi, how are you?
Hi, how are you?
Hi, how are you?
[LAUGHTER]
We also learn something new about Indian country
and hear from our elders on this "Native Report."
NARRATOR: Production of "Native Report"
is made possible by grants from the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux
Community and the Blandin Foundation.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Welcome to "Native Report."
I'm Stacey Thunder.
The Tantaquidgeon Indian Museum is
the oldest Native-American-run museum in the United States.
Operated by the Mohegan tribe of Connecticut,
the museum houses a collection of artifacts and objects
from across the continent.
WANDA SAYERS (VOICEOVER): This stone lodge
on the Mohegan Indian reservation
is the Tantaquidgeon Indian Museum, which
houses a collection of Mohegan and other Native American
artifacts.
It is dedicated to the ideal of education.
Welcome to the Tantaquidgeon Museum.
It was built in 1931 by John and Harold Tantaquidgeon.
They had housed a lot of these articles that are
in this museum in their home.
And so they decided they wanted to build a museum
and present their viewpoint to the public
so they would get to know them better.
And it was a good thing they did,
because two years after they moved all the articles up here,
their house burned down.
This particular room houses Mohegan items
for the most part.
We also have some Mohegans and northern coastal Indian items
in that one.
And the other room we call the Southwestern Room,
and it houses items from the West, Southwest,
and some South American items.
This is what we call our Leader's Board, sort of.
And there's a lot of chiefs up here
and important people to our tribes, including women.
They were all artisans.
Some of the carvings, this one particular one-- I
was mentioning the fire.
My grandfather had saved one of the beams from that
and carved this and donated this to the museum.
He also did some bead work.
This was from Chief Mataga.
He did a lot of utensils.
And these were typical wedding presents
that they would present to the brides.
Looking at these items, it reminds me
of the way things used to be.
We've changed so rapidly with the onset of gaming
that things have just progressed.
This reminds me of the old times when you would sit around
and you would actually have conversations with people
and, you know, do crafts together.
Obviously my grandfather's items are very important to me, too,
because he's-- actually, these earrings came from my father,
who got his education about beading from my grandfather.
So it's all connected somehow.
WANDA SAYERS (VOICEOVER): The Mohegan
hold their chiefs and sagems in high regard.
A statue garden honors the memory.
The medicine women also hold a special place
in Mohegan culture.
In one corner of the lodge stands a wood
carving in the likeness of Gladys Tantaquidgeon,
co-founder of the museum.
I'm standing in front of my great aunt, Gladys
Tantaquidgeon, who lived from 1899 to 2005.
She was 106 when she passed on.
And she led her people through most
of the 20th century as a medicine woman
and also as a member of the tribal council
and in many different capacities.
She learned from her traditional elders.
When she was a small child, she was selected.
They actually called her everyone's
grandmother, [INAUDIBLE].
Because she was the type of child
who really captured the imagination of the older
people, they felt that she would do great things.
The carving of Gladys is really an interesting piece.
It's made of a single piece of basswood,
which is a sacred tree to us.
It's called weecup in our language
because it's a cure-all.
It heals, which is in many ways what Gladys herself was like.
She was a healing kind of a personality,
a good-spirited person.
Gladys' belt is a very interesting piece.
It comes from a time before the American Revolution.
And what's interesting about it is
it was only worn by three women, they had such longevity.
Martha Uncas passed it on to Fidelia Fielding.
These are Mohegan women.
Fidelia Fielding's Indian name was Flying Bird.
And Flying Bird passed it on to Gladys.
And so Gladys died in 2005, and this belt,
which was only owned by three women,
came into existence in 1769.
So with it went many of our stories, with the belt.
And that's why it's such an important piece of our culture.
Gladys is holding a small basket,
which also has significance, because it relates to offerings
that we give to some of the spirits who
are important to us.
And her clothing, again, this is Eastern woodland design.
She's a tiny, tiny lady.
WANDA SAYERS (VOICEOVER): In the yard adjacent to the museum
is a replicated Mohegan village that features a traditionally
framed wigwam and longhouse,
This longhouse and a wigwam, longhouse
tended to have two or three families.
In this area, they could be up to 60 feet long
and house up to 12 families.
Every family had their own fire pot and their own beds.
They're made out of poplar, which is the outside bark.
And the inside structure is swamp cedar.
And they take the saplings, and they have to dig down.
Then you bend those saplings, cross them over time together.
So then you have that structure that you attach the bark to.
And then the outer rings hold the bark in place.
They're very well made.
In the summertime, they're very cool.
If you put the mats on the inside,
it's like air conditioning with the air circulating.
And in the winter, it's just like you're
having heating in your house, and it keeps the wigwams warm.
I think this village adds a lot, because now we have
an outside attraction as well.
And a lot of people don't even come into the museum.
They will just come and look around the village
and sit up here.
We're on Mohegan Hill.
A lot of the Mohegans lived in this area
there were, you know-- it was not just on this area,
but in this general area, this is where we all lived.
I lived across the street.
And like I said, my grandfather lived on the other side
of the museum.
So every day, I would walk through this path
to go to my grandfather's or my grandmother's house.
And Harold or Gladys or Ruth would grab me every single day
and show me something that was related to something in here.
So this is what we have.
You can't just, you now, replace any of these items.
So it's our heritage and our culture.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Did you know that the state of Massachusetts
is named after an Indian tribe?
Massachusett is a tribe of Native Americans
who historically lived in what is now greater Boston.
Tribal members spoke a language that is
part of the Algonquin family.
The present-day US state is named after the tribe.
Alternative forms of the name are Moswetuset,
where Miles Standish and Squanto first
met tribal leaders in 1621.
Massachusett translates from the Algonquin
as "the people who live near the great hill,"
Well, Moswetuset translates to "the hill
shaped like an arrowhead."
This is thought to refer to the Blue Hills located south
of Boston.
As one of the first groups of indigenous American peoples
to encounter English colonists, the Massachusett
had a rapid decline in population
in the 17th and 18th centuries due to new infectious diseases.
Descendants of the tribe continue
to inhabit the greater Boston area,
but it is not a federally recognized tribe.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
The North American Indian Center of Boston
began in 1970 as the Boston Indian Council
and was organized as a nonprofit in 1992.
They provide a modest number of services
to Native Americans in a nine-county area.
But more importantly, they provide a gathering place
for all nations.
TADD JOHNSON (VOICEOVER): A few miles west
of historic downtown Boston is the North American Indian
Center of Boston.
It was on October 20, 1970, when the center was incorporated.
This is the oldest urban Indian center in the Northeast.
We were meeting in the '60s, 1960s, right across the street
from the Boston Commons.
There were a handful of Indians.
Because we realized Indians-- this is not like other places
where you're going to find a lot of Indians in one place.
For example, Boston is a neighborhood kind of city.
For us, our numbers are so small we
don't constitute enough people to have a neighborhood.
So we're dispersed all over-- all over the city.
So this building represents who we are.
It represents who we are as a people.
And if you look around the building,
many, many different tribes here.
The '70s was a very, very exciting time.
We had Indians from everywhere.
What is the first thing an urban does-- or an Indian does
when they hit the city?
They look for an urban Indian Center.
They look for other Indians.
I've lived here for quite a few years since '63 and um,
raised my family here and have been working at the Indian
Center since, I believe it was '78, quite a few years.
And it's been very important for me to be involved
with the Native community here.
And I've been here as the employment and training
director of the North American Indian Center
of Boston for a number of years.
And we've helped a number of people
find employment by educating, by training, and trying
to help them keep those jobs.
And we work with youth and people of all ages.
And so it's important to me to make
a difference for Indian people.
TADD JOHNSON (VOICEOVER): At one time,
the center had upward of 100 employees.
But due to cutbacks, there's only a staff of five.
However, the center still provide services
to the region's Native American population.
The people that are here in the city, they need training.
Lots of times they need housing.
They need social services.
They need an advocate.
I mean, one of the things is, yes,
we-- to lose the Indian Health Service
contract did devastate us.
But we're still here.
Right now, I think we have just five employees.
And a lot of that happened with the-- over time,
having, you know, not just the federal recognition,
but the loss of a contract that was over half a million dollars
is hurting us.
Now we have lots of folks who help us and don't get paid.
And I think you're only going to find that in Indian country.
You're not going to find that in these big corporations
that people put their whole heart and souls without getting
any compensation whatsoever.
We don't.
My board in particular, our board of directors
works very, very hard.
They are not just figureheads.
They work.
Because without them working, we couldn't even get this far.
TADD JOHNSON (VOICEOVER): Joanne and Janice
are also commissioners on the Massachusetts
Commission on Indian Affairs.
Both view their appointments as another way
to serve the greater Boston Native American community.
In Massachusetts, we have a number
of Indian people separated.
We have some of the tribes are here,
but we also have just Indian people
who have moved to Massachusetts for education
or a number of different reasons.
The job of the commission is to help native people anyway
that's needed.
It might be legal, might be educational, might be health.
But all of these issues come to the commission.
And as commissioners, we discuss them, and we deal with them,
and we advocate to the state government what
might be a good solution for Native people.
I'm not saying they always listen to us
or take our advice.
However, we're there to make sure that that advice is given.
I represent the North American Indian Center on the commission
to have a place where Indians can come together and meet
other Indians and-- and just feel like you're connected.
It's like family, you know.
And that's this place.
I think the creator blessed us in many ways,
too, and saved us.
Because, indeed, we are still here.
And we're challenged, but look how long
we've been serving our people.
You will always be welcomed here
at 105 South Huntington Avenue.
You will always be embraced and there will always
be a smile for you when you come through that front door.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
What these people have just done
is reenacted this march back on November 7
through the 13, 1862, when 1,700 of our people, primarily women
and children, were force-marched 150
miles from southwestern Minnesota,
around the Morton Redwood Falls area,
150 miles to the concentration camp.
And again, soldiers enforced this.
We just got done there with that little ceremony
where a lot of us were carrying like a twig with a-- well,
like a branch, I guess, with ribbons on it.
And on those, on the ribbons, was names of known people
who were on that march.
And, uh, and the young people who are running it,
they were very thoughtful, and they
knew that one of my relatives was
Haza Win, her name, and that means
in English "Blueberry Woman."
And they gave me her, that-- that branch
with the-- with the name, with the ribbon on it to carry.
And then in a circle, we were to put it down.
And, uh, anyway, uh, when I put it down, we just said,
uh, [SPEAKING NATIVE LANGUAGE] Tears came to my eyes.
I said, you know, Haza Win, Blueberry Woman,
thank you so much for what you have done.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Comedian Charlie Hill's first television appearance
was on "The Richard Pryor Show" in 1977.
He was also the first Native American comedian
to appear on "The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson."
Charlie wrote for television and appeared at venues
all over the world until he passed away in 2013.
Next, a legend and pioneer in comedy
and an inspiration to many, Charlie Hill.
[APPLAUSE]
Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you,
thank you.
Um, it's been a great evening here and everything.
And white folks, you were here two hours, not one incident.
I'm so proud of you people.
[LAUGHTER]
[APPLAUSE]
Cause everywhere you go, lots of white people,
there's always trouble.
[LAUGHTER]
It got a little quiet in here, didn't it?
Oh.
And I'm just kidding.
You're not white.
You're all pink like raw hot dogs.
[LAUGHTER]
Indian is what I am, and comedy is what I do.
I've never called myself an Indian comedian,
though some people say it.
They mean it different.
When Indians say it, they mean it different than the nons.
And I mean ***.
Uh, uh, uh-- [LAUGHS ] What-- you know,
that's something we never see in real life, non-Indian.
We say it in polite, academic discussions.
But we've never say it in real life.
Look at those non-Indians over there by the pickup.
We don't-- we don't do that, you know.
Anyway, I've never called myself that.
I don't mind they refer to me that.
But you never say you're a Jewish attorney or a ***
athlete or so on.
So-- so I just-- you know, Indian is what I am,
and comedy is what I do.
And I'm, uh-- you know, Seinfeld calls himself an observation
comic.
So that's what I do.
But I see it through Native eyes.
We can fix it because we have--
TADD JOHNSON (VOICEOVER): The storytelling tradition
of Native cultures expresses the truth, wisdom, and the humor
of human existence.
Comedian Charlie Hill was a storyteller
who related his life experiences to all audiences,
but used humor as his medium.
The war on terrorism-- hell, we've
been fighting terrorism since 1492.
[CHEERING]
Every comedian has a different point
of view, whatever their background is in doing it.
There's a lot of comedians that are cookie cutter
and they all sound the same.
Then there's ones that have their own unique thing.
And I think the best ones are the ones that are
real and true and like that.
So-- so I talk about my experiences
through my point of view.
And then as I got older, I got bolder.
And as I got older, I had more things to talk about.
When I started, I was more blunt than funny.
And-- but when I got older, I started
having family and more experience,
and I got more maturity to my delivery and everything.
So I think if you grow as a person,
you grow as anything else you do, and that's the idea of it.
I think that Energizer Bunny must be Indian,
because he's got the little hand drum he uses all the time,
you know?
[LAUGHTER]
[SIMULATES DRUM NOISE]
I think when you talk to Indians, if you're Indian,
you're talking to family.
So when you're talking to your family at the dinner table,
you don't have to preface anything.
You can go into a story about your brother,
and they know what you're talking about.
With Natives, our experiences-- if I
did a [? BIE ?] joke in a club, they--
pfft-- they wouldn't know what that meant.
So if I'm in LA, I might do a Hollywood Boulevard
joke or an LA thing.
[SIMULATES SMOKING] I went to college
five and a half years, folks, and I became a sophomore.
I tell you, those years are really meaningful to me.
You know how bad I did?
I was probably the only Indian in history
ever to flunk archery.
I'll tell you, that's really embarrassing.
[LAUGHTER]
Most Americans know Indians from the attitudes toward them.
They don't know them, you know, when they're kids,
they grew up playing cowboys and Indians
or they see us in objects that count, you know,
10 little Indians.
That's why I sing "10 little Whiteys" when I do the shows,
show them how stupid that is.
And-- and also, uh, when you get them to laugh,
then they connect.
That's-- that's really what I do.
With-- with Indian people, it's like talking to the family.
With the nons, sometimes I talk in the third graders,
because they don't know Indian people.
And I think when white folks don't know Indians,
then they don't know America.
Because we're right in their faces,
and after all these years of they don't know us,
how can they know anything more about their own science,
their art, their own medicine, and what's
good for people on the other side of the globe?
Here we are right there, and they're still studying us.
White folks, you wouldn't even be here
if it weren't for Indian people.
There wouldn't even be an America wasn't for us,
you know.
This would still be Europe, Junior.
You came to this country, and we taught you how to survive.
We taught you about democracy.
We taught you how to fight the British so you could be free.
Hide behind the trees!
[LAUGHTER]
TADD JOHNSON (VOICEOVER): Charlie
did his time on the comedy circuit
and stepped into the national spotlight
by appearing on the "Richard Pryor Show" in 1977.
[APPLAUSE]
(CHANTING) Hi, how are you?
Hi, how are you?
Hi, how are you?
Hi, how are you?
[LAUGHTER]
I, um, usually have problems doing my act,
you know, because I, uh, know a lot of you
white people never seen an Indian
do stand-up comedy before, you know.
Like for so long, you probably thought that Indians never
had a sense of humor, you know?
We never thought you were too funny, either.
[LAUGHTER]
Well, I learned my stuff at The Comedy Store.
Here's a plug, Mitzi.
And-- and, uh, when I was in line with David Letterman,
he had long hair and a beard, and Mike Douglas,
who became Michael Keaton.
And we all auditioned there at the same time.
There was, uh, God, everybody came out of there, Roseanne,
much later after she came from Denver, Arsenio Hall.
Uh, Leno came through there, even though he
was established in New York.
But anybody you can think of come there.
And it's the toughest nightclub in the world.
And you can be the biggest thing in Chicago, Minneapolis,
whatever, but you come to the Comedy Store,
you're just another guy.
So being young and not knowing better,
I was-- I jumped into the deep water
and I learned how to do it, trial and error.
That's how you do it.
You train in bombing.
And so when I would, uh, tape my stuff and listen to it,
I would go, is this joke too offensive to them,
or they don't get it, or is it just not a funny joke?
And often it would be that.
And also with comedians, we're real vulnerable.
And sometimes there's natural resentment.
So when you see, uh, somebody in the room playing the guitar,
most people don't-- oh, they listen, they got talent.
But if you see somebody you've never
heard of standing there trying to talk,
the natural thing is, hey, honey, I can do that.
Who's this guy?
And then with comedians, when they don't like the comedian,
they not only not like him, they hate that guy, you know?
Bill Cosby?
I hate that-- you know, it's like, see, that's how it is.
We're up there bearing our soul, and it goes right through it,
you know?
So that's kind of the stuff you deal with.
And for years after that, I was paranoid.
I'm glad that wore off tonight.
Nothing would have been worse than a paranoid comedian.
What are you laughing at?
[LAUGHTER]
TADD JOHNSON (VOICEOVER): Sadly, Charlie passed away
on December 30, 2013.
But he paved a legendary and revolutionary path
for every Native comic.
And his gentle ways and humor is missed by the friends, family,
and audiences he leaves behind.
A guy came up to me today, and he was just a-- a right wing
lobbyist.
And he came up to me, you know, white man,
any he said he really liked my show.
And that just made me think, it's just
if you got a sense of humor or not,
it doesn't matter what you are.
So-- so I think that's cool.
You know, you can believe in what you want,
but if you're laughing together, then that breaks that barrier,
you know?
And I find if you got a sense of humor,
it doesn't matter if you're Native or not,
it's if you have a sense of humor.
So that's what I talk about, and the stereotypes.
We're the most stereotyped people in the world, I think.
Power of the spirit, too, you know.
That's African Americans, they're living proof,
too, you can't extinguish the human spirit.
And they brought us the blues, they taught us, you know?
[PLAYING HARMONICA]
It's just like our stuff.
[PLAYING HARMONICA]
[BEATBOXING]
[LAUGHTER]
[PLAYING HARMONICA]
You know, I met a guy before the show you,
he's really proud of his heritage.
He says, Charlie, you know, my great, great grandfather
was African American and Native American.
I'm thinking, that poor ***.
They bit only stole his land, they
made him work on it for free.
[LAUGHTER]
Thank you very much, folks.
Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.
[APPLAUSE AND CHEERING]
STACEY THUNDER (VOICEOVER): For more information
about "Native Report" or the stories we've covered,
look for us at nativereport.org, Facebook, and Twitter.
Thank you for spending time with us here on Native Report.
I'm Stacey Thunder.
We'll see you again.
NARRATOR: Stacey Thunder is Ojibwe
from the Red Lake and Lac Courte Oreilles Nations
and is the Legislative Counsel for the Mille Lacs
Band of Ojibwe.
Professor Tadd Johnson is the director
of the Master of Tribal Administration
and Governance Program at the University of Minnesota Duluth
and is an enrolled member of the Bois Forte Band of Chippewa.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Production of "Native Report" is made possible by grants
from the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community and the Blandin
Foundation.
Closed captioning is provided by the Grand Portage
Band of Lake Superior Chippewa.