Viewing NYC Articles Categorized Under Native Americans

A Giant Digital Totem Centerpieces an Exhibit at the American Museum of Natural History

2016-08-01T10:46:50-04:00

The American Museum of Natural History recently installed a massive touch screen "digital totem" to bring historical and cultural information to its visitors.

Museum visitors are able to "meet" Native residents in photos and interviews, examine 30 artifacts from the Museum’s collection via 360-degree rotations, listen to local languages, and create their own Northwest Coast soundscapes with recordings of natural features, animals, and local instruments.

The next time you visit the American Museum of Natural History, be sure to visit the Hall of Northwest Coast Indians to check it out in person.

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Slate Uncovers the Negotiations Behind the 1670 Sale of Staten Island to the Colony of New York

2015-04-28T15:56:40-04:00

A recent article on Slate, written by Barnard College Assistant Professor of History Andrew Lipman, titled A Hard Bargain tells the story of the how "the Munsee Indians sold Staten Island under duress—but not before they got the colony of New York to make some surprising concessions."

The 1670 Staten Island deed and the minutes of negotiations show in detail how these transfers worked. Though the papers document the eviction of native peoples, they also are evidence of a 40-year process of contestation and of more than a week of face-to-face negotiations.

Common assumptions and myths suggest that the Native Americans knew nothing about the value of their land, and that they did not believe in ownership of it, but the negotiations prove otherwise. The Munsee Indians knew what they were doing, and worked with the Colonists to maximize their end of the deal.

The Munsee delegation returned with a request for 600 fathoms of the beads, the colonists counter-offered only half that; finally they all settled on 400 fathoms. […] In a similar back-and-forth, the Indians convinced the colonists to triple the amount of clothing offered and significantly increased the gifts of guns, lead, powder, hoes, and knives.

The full article on Slate is a a fascinating read on a relatively unknown part of New York City history.

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1946 Map of the Native American Trails That Evolved Into Brooklyn's Major Arteries

2015-01-28T15:48:14-05:00

It's no secret that the New York City area used to be inhabited by Native American tribes before the Dutch and English pushed them out. The tribes had been settled here for centuries if not millennia, and over that time, some foot paths had been etched in the dirt as means to get from area to area. These paths were mapped out in 1946 by James A. Kelly, who served as the Borough of Brooklyn Historian from 1944 to 1971.

Our friends at the Brooklyn Heights Blog recently dug up the old map and did a bit of analysis on it, noting that many of those same paths evolved into the main arteries that dissect Brooklyn neighborhoods today.

Interesting to see some of the trails that exist today as major thoroughfares, like Fulton Street, Flatbush Avenue and part of Atlantic Avenue. [...] the Werpos village of the Indian burial ground had a twin village located around today’s City Hall. [...] One other site I noticed was a park extending from Columbia Street to Smith Street, and from Atlantic Avenue to Kane Street (and labeled as “Sassians” on the map). I guessed it was park of today’s Van Voorhees park, and indeed nycgovparks.org has more information.

via Brooklyn Heights Blog

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