Indian organization wants museum renamed to reflect victimization

Observer Staff

1/25/2005 12:00:00 AM

The Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of the American Indian ignores the historical atrocities against Native Americans and its name should reflect this victimization, according to American Indian Movement officials.

"While the Museum displays the beautiful culture of Native peoples, it must also serve as an institution of education about America's holocaust on the American Indian," stated a Sept. 21 press release from the American Indian Movement Grand Governing Council. "The fact that the Smithsonian Institution still holds in its vaults thousands of skulls and skeletal remains and funerary objects of our ancestors, most victims of this holocaust could, as a beginning, be made a part of the memorial to this great crime against humanity. This museum must forever be named and referred to as the National Holocaust Museum of the American Indian."

The press release, distributed at the opening and at a National Congress of American Indians-hosted rally the next day, also gave credit to those who made the museum a reality.

"This magnificent institution connected to the Smithsonian Institution will stand forever in displaying the beautiful culture of the Indigenous peoples of what is now called the Americas with special focus on the great cultures of the Indian people of North, Central and South America," it also stated. "We congratulate A. Richard West (Cheyenne/Arapahoe), the museum's founding director and Dwight Gourneau (Ojibwe), the museum's board chairman, as well as Sens. Ben Nighthorse Campbell-R, Colorado and Daniel Inouye D, Hawaii who authored the original legislation, and the many others who made the National Museum of the American Indian a reality."

It estimated that as many as 15 million Native people fell victim to the American holocaust since the pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock, according to AIM officials.

"They were victims of biological warfare by way of smallpox-infected blankets from Valley Forge and distributed to the Native people by Lord Jeffrey Amherst and George Washington, and by military aggression, force, violence and terrorism across the breath of our sacred lands," they maintained. "The American Indian Movement Grand Governing Council, however, feels that the museum falls short in that it does not characterize or does it display the sordid and tragic history of America's holocaust against the Native nations and peoples of the Americas."