To be politically correct It's a Native American Trading post these days.
A rose by any other name would....... Still play hell with my allergy's :-)
Jay, I have a problem with that. Every time I'm asked what race I am I want to put down Native American! I was born in this great country and should be aloud to say that.
Happy motoring, Warren
I live in a state with seven Indian reservations and have a lot of friends who are either living on or originally from the rez. Virtually every one of them calls him or her self Indian and is proud of it.
I just spent an interesting half hour with an auctioneer that I worked with on an auction near the Blackfeet (it's Blackfeet, not Blackfoot) rez and was fascinated by his story of the mountain we could see from the farm where the auction was about Nopi, the Owl and the Eagle; which are rock formations on the mountain, who judge the souls of people when they die to see if they can go to the Sweetgrass country for eternity or if they have to go back and try to do better where they were.
He was telling about an old man who was "One of the last of the old blanket Indians" who had 40 wives and countless children, where they lived and how they lived and on and on.
He gave me a small bag of Sweetgrass to carry in my pickup for good luck and invited me to come with him for a day to go around and see some of the old Blackfeet sites he knows about. His grandmother was full blood and his grandfather was half so he is steeped in the tradition of the tribe. He sings at the Blackfeet funerals (which are interesting combinations of Christian and Blackfeet beliefs) and makes up the Sweetgrass sticks that are burned like incense during the ceremony. The smoke carries the soul to Heaven or the Sweetgrass Hills, depending on what the deceased believed, most people would prefer the Sweetgrass Hills to Heaven. He also does the "Remember & Blessing Ceremony" at the site of the Cutbank Massacre where troopers killed nearly 300 old men, women and children in January. I consider it an honor that he has asked me to come and be part of it but I have never been able to go.
He is Blackfeet himself and refers to himself as a "Blackfeet Indian" not a "Blackfeet Native American." I think you will find that true in most places in the west. Montana has Blackfeet, Flathead, Nez Perce, Crow, Cheyenne, Assiniboine, Little Shell and several other tribes. They all call themselves Indian and there are bumper stickers on a lot of horse trailers and pickups here that say "xxxxx Indian and proud of it."
Politically correct may be correct in some places but here in the West we just are what we are and let the chips fall.
Here our native American people are called the "Viejas Band of Kumeyaay Indians". The directions on the highway to their reservation call it "Viejas Indian Reservation". If this is the way these people refer to themselves and they are happy with it, why change?
I really don't understand "political correctness" Names of things are changed just to make the person who changed it look important. Look what happened to disabilities. When I was young it was refered to as "crippled" then it became "handicapped", then "disabled" then "people with disabilities" then "challenged"
We all know these names refer to basically the same condition or conditions. Same with names for races or ethnic groups.
In many ways the changes just lead to confusion.
Norm
I am getting tired of this politically correct SH*T
ME TOO!!!
That is politically correct bovine excrement to you.
There is nothing "correct" about "politically correct"! It is all B S. It is nothing more than a way to put you down by telling you that you say it wrong, and must say it my way to be correct.
As to ancestry. Many of my ancestors came to this continent way back in the 1600s. I sometimes say that I don't know if I am a native American or a conqueror. I also sometimes say that I do know which. I did not choose to be born here. And I did not kill any Indians or steal any land. My ancestors chose to fight on the side to free the slaves, so I do not owe any reparations there, either. I also do not hold any hostilities toward anyone whose ancestors fought on any side of any war before I was born. Regardless of the side they fought on, I believe that they should honor their ancestors as I honor mine. I also believe that no war should be fought over anything that happened more than ten years ago.
Enough out of me.
Great photo!
Thank you, Jay!
Drive carefully, and enjoy, W2
"Jay, I have a problem with that. Every time I'm asked what race I am I want to put down Native American! I was born in this great country and should be aloud to say that."
I have a (White) pal who is a naturalized American citizen but he was born in South Africa. He has an absolute ball with any form that asks for 'race/nationality'. If the euphemism for 'race' isn't 'White or Black' on the form, he selects 'African American'. Because he IS more 'African American' than 99% of the 'Black' people in this country.
It goes even further than you say, Wayne. It not only is it a put down on the face of it telling you that you said it wrong, it also suggests that you're either stupid, that you are in fact a bigot, or both.
Gee, and there is me thinking it was a curry & spice house...
Good one, Dennis.
Reminded me of, "Africa, the country; Africa, the continent. What's the difference?"
Former candidate for VP.
I foresee the day when redneck jokes will not be politically correct.
If it's OK with them it's OK with me.
A good friend of mine is the Keeper of the Pipe for his tribe in Northern Montana. His name is Two Elk Standing. His pipe is 160+ years old. He has replaced the stems a couple times as have the keepers from before him. Last time I went through Glacier Park was with him and he invited me to a sweat lodge the next month. I told him I would join him but I refused to smoke from his small pipe. He wasn't too disappointed. He seemed to enjoy the leaves and seeds in his little pipe much more than the Kinnikinnick in the big pipe. He was disappointed and feeling a little down at the time because "his wife had left him for a better woman" (his words). How's that for Political Correctness.
I have often wondered; three of my Grandparents were not born in this country, but the fourth (whom I never met, as my Grandmother divorced him in 1929 & he died before I was born), who's name I carry (Dewey) is descended from Thomas Dewey who came here in 1633. When does that part of my heritage become "Native American." Archeologists claim that even the many different people we call "Native American" originally immigrated here too!
(Tongue somewhat in cheek)
Good lord Ralph, you paint a grim picture. And I am only being sort of facetious.
I apologize, I didn't want to upset anyone, I just expressed my own personal view.
Happy motoring, Warren
Plenty Coups, tribal chief of the Mountain Crow people said "Our Wise Ones learned much from the animals and birds who heal themselves from wounds. But our faith in them perished after the white man came, and now too late, we know that with all his wonderful powers, the white man is not wise. He is smart, but not wise, and fool only himself.
I was in Flagstaff once, getting a seal replaced in my Aerostar's transmission. Curious, I asked one of the men there (he was pretty much the same bland European descent that I am) if the native American people in Flagstaff preferred to be referred to as Native American, or Indian.
"Navajo" was his answer.
A later trip, I was in Kayenta, AZ, heading home from our December convention. After reading the poster in the Burger King outlining the heroism and contribution of the Navajo Code Talkers during WWII, I asked a man (native American) the same questions, "Sir, with all respect, after reading this poster about the Code Talkers, I want to refer to these men the way they, and their descendants, prefer. How is that? Is it Native American, or Indian?"
Looking me directly in the eye, "Navajo" was his unhesitating, unequivocal answer.
The white guy in Flagstaff was right.
Driving through Arizona I was outraged the hear people on the radio speaking Navajo. If they can't speak English like real Americans they ought to go back where they came from.
Ha ha Steve. Good one!
So, I'm still confused..... can we laugh at the "cave man" jokes, or not?????
If by cave man you are thinking of Neanderthal, watch out. They were successful for 270,000 years, until they were bred out of existence by modern man 30-40,000 years ago. Unless you are pure African stock, you probably carry some Neanderthal DNA.
When the white man came to this country, the Indians where running it. No debt. No taxes. Women did all the work. White man thought that he could improve the system.
And to think this whole thread started over an old car parked in front of a store!
I'm still waiting to hear what the politicians of the United States Postal Service rename those mail receptacles in front of their offices...
Funny Steve, I had the same experience going thru Arizona.
Joe,
The "cave men" lived in Arizona. There are many "cliff dwellings" in that state, and in the cliffs are caves where the people lived. These were the ancestors of the Hopi and Navajo.
Norm