As CHRISTmas 2005 approaches and the year winds down, I've been thinkin' 'bout what all has transpired over the past 12 months. The best perspective I could come up with was "man the world sure is messed up these days."
I've seen probably 300 Southern Heritage violations this year maybe more. The list of liberal whiners grows with each passin' day, and if ya don't hold your mouth just right, it offends someone. When do Southerners get the opportunity to be offended? It is as easy to bash anything even remotely related, connected, or containing the word Confederate as it is to shoot fish in a barrel. Yet if a Southron was to say 1/10 of what is said to him or her about any other group of individuals, well frankly you could look for the SPLC ,ACLU, or some other alphabet soup to be knockin' on your door with papers that say "see ya in court". That just ain't right!!
Ok, I could write volumes on Southern issues but, let us move on.
So, let's take just one of countless Indian issues in 2005, just one, cause ya'll don't want to get me started on Indian issues, cause if I did ya'll would go blind before I finished. So let's talk about how once again in 2005 we have petitioned for a Native American month. Now, I don't like using the term Native American it's too PC for me, but for the sake of argument that's the term petitioned for. Did we get it this year, after year after year of petitioning the guverment for one?????????? Hell, no.........closest we got was National Horse Month. Now, me and mine love horses, in fact before we moved here we has 22 head of horses, and of course to the American Indian the horse is known as the sacred dog..........but give me a break...........give us our month. For that matter give us a white people month, a yellow, brown, green or purple. We are all God's children in His eyes so lets be as fair with each other as God........ is with all of us. Whoa T what are you thinking??
Ok we've covered Southron, Injun, how about Christian issues? (Not that Southrons and Indians aren't Christian), in fact the numbers would astound most skeptics in regards to that. Ok so how many times this year have you read in the paper or online or heard on the radio or TV that to be proud of being Christian is taboo? Shucks, I can't cypher that large a number.
Ya'll got to be aware that the newest target for discrimination is those of the Christian faith...........People they are comin' after you, and they are comin' swingin'..
I'm willin' to bet my best guitar that if someone had an Oscar winning screenplay based on anything remotely Christian, no producer , financier, or corporate sponsor would touch it with a dead possum on the end of a ten foot pole. To me that is the greatest travesty on this earth. That it is uncool and politically incorrect to be proud that one is Christian. Where does it all end??????? Have you had your fill of the nonsense? If so what's your next move? My suggestion, is get out of the recliner and find a grass roots organization that holds to the beliefs that out Nation's founding fathers believed in, and help best as you can to move the country back in that direction.
Blessin's to all.
T.

With ice and snow covering the ground here at Mole Church, I see little reason for gettin' out and about (at least until it is time to pick Mayme up from school) lol...

So with no pressing plans for the day, I sat out early goin' through the first of 10 large plastic containers filled with family history on my Mommas' side. I inherited  one half of  my aunts geneological works that she spent over 60 years compiling and  which produced two books and many various publications.  My sister received an equal number of the same large containers. I am talkin' literally thousands of of handwritten and typed pages, photos, etc.  In an amongst the first two files I pulled this AM were Revolutionary War, War of 1812, and WBTS pension papers of several ancestors Robinsons, Johnstons, Arbuckles, Skinners, and Smiths.  It was like Christmas came early in the form of family history.

After goin' through the pension papers and such I came across a old yellowed envelope inside were the remenants of what was a letter. Ratty , torn, weathered and worn I knew it was way older than the envelope  post marked 1941 that held it. I sat the envelope down and went and got my white cotton officers gloves (only been to one real ball) so they were like spotless.  So feelin' like some kind of museum curator lol, I most carefully took the paper out of the envelope. It was  one sheet,folded in half  dogeared and missing portions .It appeared to me to be very similar to butcher paper, I suppose it could have been stationary if so, low quality, I am not really all that familar with paper stock.  In the right hand corner was the date, week of Christmas 1863. Under the date was 7 Gables Tavern. The writing is in very faded pencil, I suppose pencil written letters would be quite common from a Confederate private  and thats what the author was . I know that for a fact as he was my gg grandfather.

This was not the first time I had heard of 7 Gables Tavern. I had heard my aunt mention it years and years ago. I had read other family correspondence about three years past where the tavern was mentioned. In that correspondence the term copperheads was used it was not in reference to snakes either. Although, I'm sure ole Abe thought of them in that manner. 

There were fragmented sentences and the writing so faded, few lines were legible.  However, a word here and there was quite clear.

I did get the jest that it was a place of meeting and that my gg grandaddy had not traveled there alone. The name Donly was mentioned and checking my ancestors' Co's muster I found a Donnely, I would leave  me to believe to the conclusion that poor spellin' runs in my family lol.

I put the slip of paper back in the envelope, back into the folder I found it in , and sealed the container once again.  I could have looked for hours upon hours and never read every word that the one container held. That is no exaggeration at all.........there must be a hundred manila file folders in the one box alone.

I remembered back in the early 1960's when my aunt travelled to Ohio to meet with her brother who lived out there, and how she had spent the better part of a day searchin' for the tavern in hopes that it still existed and that someone would be able to better inform her in regards to it.  That trip led her to believe that the tavern was nothin' more than a pile of rubble, she might have been correct that the collapsed building she saw was 7 Gables Tavern, after considerable research today, I am not so sure that is the case.

After searchin' several pages on the net today simply typing in "7 Gables Tavern  in Richland Co. Ohio" I came across a description that led to another link "haunted places in Ohio" and there low and behold was photographs inside and outside alike ,of  what had been a tavern built in 1847 with 7 gables and 5 fireplaces, and is now a bed and breakfast beautifully restored complete with all its original furnishings.  It is no longer called 7 Gables and hasn't been for as long as I could discover. (I do plan to call the owner and see if he or she can confirm that I have found the correct place.)

I do know this, my gg grandaddy was born in that county and lived there as a child prior to movin' to Indiana, and several family members of that pioneer family stayed in that county . I have  near a dozen  first and second cousins that reside within a half hours drive of the place. I have only met three first cousins  from out there( my Mommas' brothers children)  they moved from Illinois in the early 50's  but, they visited us many times in my youth. Unfortunately  my uncle passed away last year

I have high hopes that the place now known as "Oak Hill Cottage" is in truth the 7 Gables Tavern, for if so I wish to visit it, ( even though it  be in in Yankee land  . For if it is 7 Gables Tavern, then I shall be able to retrace one more Copperhead pathway  that my gg grandaddy walked and rode. One more connection to why I stay in this God forsaken state, and fight his battle in my own way. I have been to two actual sites where he was on raids, but I have traveled hundreds of the same miles he rode. 

The idea of staying even overnite in a place where copperheads gathered,  where hushed conversations of strategy and war finances were discussed ,and where one day or night during the week of Christmas 1863 my  Confederate Hoosier ancestor took pencil to paper and wrote some  message to be delivered by some means unknown to me to  either his family in Indiana or perhaps to  kin he still  had in Ohio. I have ruled out that it was written to family that remained in VA. and NC. , for I don't believe the letter would be in my possession at this time. It most likely was intended for sympathetic kin in Ohio, or back to love ones in Indiana. Obviously by whatever means it was  delivered . Now ,findin' it today, especially at this time of the year it is a most special "Early Christmas Gift " to say the least. It is to me like it was delivered once again,  passed  along hand to hand mysteriously........... with  purpose. A few simple faded lines from a  Confederate soldier travelin' behind enemy lines to his family  who they themselves were trapped behind the lines. And, all this at Christmas time.

There is a most familar ring to this, almost too familar. I've heard it said many times that "history repeats itself" Indian teachins' say that "life is but a circle" I can't help but feel that these statements are most true at least in regards to my family, and the Cause and the Charge.

May all here have a most Blessed Christmas, from a Copperhead sired from fine ConfederateStock, and his family still behind enemy lines.

God Bless,

T.

 

 

It seems all one need do this week is turn on a radio, TV, computer, or pick up a newspaper, and without looking very hard you will see or hear of some group of "these or thats"  who have made it their "goal of the day" to object to Christmas.   I'm sure I have read a dozen or more reports in just the past couple of days, and I'm sure there are new ones happening as I write this.

I may be an old guy, but my memory is good. I certainly can remember Christmas growin' up in the 50's........how special a time it was . I can also remember how this PC feces stuff didn't exist.....and how great a place America was then.......that was then ..this is now!

I have noticed though it would appear that the regular American seems to be havin' his fill of this nonsence,At least as far as Christmas goes.  I have read where the regular "Joe and Joan" have been complaining to corparate America or  should that be "Corrupt Amerika?" that they want to call Christmas Christmas, a Christmas song a Christmas song etc. The time for such actions  is long overdue,  that is if  nation  (originally based on freedom from Religious Persecution) is to longer exist.   Let those people start with Christmas, then it will be Easter, then  next it will be your religion as a whole......

Don't believe it? Check out a history book prior to 1970 something....... that is, if you can still lay ya'lls hands on one............look to see what happened when the  powers that began with the Lincoln administration and those devoted followers of his that came after, see what they did in regards to the religion (s) of the Plains Indians........Takin' the land wasnt enough, or the buffalo, how about let's go after  their dances, and sacred ceremonies, how about their language (s) too? It's all there to read, and it's a lesson to be learned....call it a wake up call from 150 years past if nothing else.  The taking away has really never stopped either. Oh, we ,made  a little progress in getting some of the old ways and traditions back in the late 1960' early 70's but for the most part we have lost more than we regained.

When my grandpa Warren left OK as a boy, years back........things happend that he never forgot......he related some stories to me of those times I put those stories to lyrics in 1998,Blue and I worked together on the music (personallyI think it one of the best songs we ever wrote. It was recorded  on the 1999 QWICHERBICHEN cd.It's titled  "Wazahazhe" The name is what my people the OSAGE called themselves......the entire song came to life in less than ten minutes, because when grandpa told the stories he painted them visually in my mind,  Thirty some years later I could still see the pictures...............

There was a time on the land, when just to survive consequence at hand

'was in 1904 in the year of your Lord, our numbers were few from Getty's point of view" in a Packard he came.bringin' his reign for dimes on he dollar... my people he collared..............seems overnite the towns they came, taverns and pool halls are much the same.  satin ladies with sickness inside after  three years of pleasure two thousand had died..............   chant"oh my I aaaaaah Ishti I aye Wazahazhe"

They cut our hair and sent us to school, taught us to speak a language new, made illegal our religion coerced amnesia of old ways, why barrels of oil flowed from our land, raping our culture and shattering our hands...Oh my I aaaah  I aye ha ..Ishti I waw Wazahazhe.......(the remainder of the song is basicall  all chant and heavy tom tom, and some incredible guitar work............) but the message is in the words.

Times were already hard enough  trying to exist on land no one else wanted.............then oil was found  and it all changed. we went from bein' the poorest  to the richest..........then the tainted ladies were brought in, the  whiskey flowed like rivers  and before our eyes everything basically  was stolen again..........

The same thing is happening to Christians all across the country right now..............naw you dont have the  oil  the OSAGE did,  so it isnt bein' stolen and no, oil barons arent bringing in prostitutes with STDs and goin'after Christians in an effort to kill off the community..................but, there are bad people out there goin' after your religious symbols, and terminology.............just wait , do nothing, and they will steal your religion right out from under your noses.

What a sad sad day that will be! I pray it never happens, but my ancestors prayed all the time, it happened to them. I pray all the time bad still happens of course time to time that's just life I guess. But, when you lose your prayers, your religion, your beliefs, you lose it all.................even your hope.  The loss of hope is the most tragic of all.........the loss of hope means a defeated people..We as Christians must NEVER lose  our faith, our symbols, our hope, nor even what we consider holidays (although I never think of the birth and death of my Saviour as a holiday ). To me those days are days of celebration, saddness, rebirth and celebration again..

So the next time you learn of someone, group etc. that doesn't like the word Christmas,  Easter,  your cross, or your faith.don't be a lamb to the slaughter stand up use the phone, the mail, the www, or your voice.................and scream it to the world "that you have had enough".......becasue if you don't "they will steal your religion" then what are you do????????What will you have left????????

Blessin's to all

T.

 

 

 

 

As this mornin' winds down and into the mid-day, I am struggeling with the remanants of thoughts  that I had prior to callin' it a night last evening. Those thoughts carried over into dreams and still weigh on my mind at this time.

The whole scenrio came from the most unlikely of sources.....an episode of "Little House on the Prairie"......... having watched that show regularly durin' the years that my two eldest daughters were youngen's.........(and hadn't watched it in years) feelin' a bit nostagilic for quality TV..........I watched, from the opening to closing credits. It was an episode I had never seen and frankly an hour well spent.

The premise of the show..........everyone is standin' around Walnut Grove (must been near 30 people in town that day).largest cast scene I ever remember including the church and school scenes lol.. back to the story.........a young boy comes galloping in on his horse as "sort of Indian music" plays in the background.........just typical enough Hollyweird not to really use  the real thing (music,) for the most part they had  however cast some real bloods in the show. Well I thought to myself, "well this is gonna be a Injun episode how bad will they portray us this time?"   Bout that time 3 Indians ride up ....wardrobe was'nt all that and a biscuit............ they had a Souix, Apache, and a Cheyenne look all goin' at the same time...........they were suppose to be  Souix ...Santee if memory serves me right. Of course everyone in town  has a look of total terror, Mike Landon walks out and inquires what they want.............the jest of it they need a white man's doctor..... when the towns dr. say's he will go with them, this real jerk (suppose to be Irish) tells the dr. he's not to go and follows the thought up by saying "let them find a colored doctor" . I about fell off the couch.........and said out loud " ya'll can't say colored"..........then I rembered  this was late 70's early 80's guess ya could  say that then without too large of repercussions (or was that reperations?). I then again thought outloud" yeah right like an Indian  durin' that time period is gonna want to see a colored dr..does the term Buffalo Soldier ring a bell????...

Ok, so then Landon and the doc ride to the Indian encampment, where they discover the old Chief has had fallen victim to a stroke.  They also learn that this small band has "jumped the Reservation" and  were on their way to Canada. (OH Canada home of the great White Queen Mother). We did get treated a little better up there  in the  mid to late 1800's..... of course it wouldn't have taken much. It was probably mostly due to vastness of space and considerably fewer people per capita.

Well the doc tells em that the Chief can't be moved although the Yankee army is in hot pursuit.......so Landon invites the Chief and his immediate family to come stay at the little house till the chief gets better  (or dies I guess ,whichever comes first)...... So upon arrival at  the house on the prairie, the misses  her usual good Christian self as is the youngest daughter.........the teenage daughter is her usual troubled self. and calls em Godless heathens; to which her daddy is most quick to point out that they may look, act, and have different beliefs but, they are all God's children.  When a young Indian girl is frightened by the Ingels' family they learn that her mother had been murdered by whites..This sheds a whole new light onto the storyline....... and Landon goes on to tell "pretty historically accurate" I might add, of to the countless horrors that had been perpetrated upon the Indian peoples....the message so far is a better understanding between a small families one white one red.

It goes this way for awhile then the (hate filled Irishman) (not really fair to the Irish) but I guess they had to have someone with an accent to play the bad guy, and everyone knows the Irish like a good fight..so anyway the bad guy learns that the Indian family is at the Ingels' home, he goes back to get  the local hothead Indian haters club guys, while in this time the good guys load up the old Chief and the rest of his clan and head North........So after sometime the doc tells them the old Chief can't travel any further, so they make  camp knowing full well they are outnumbered and the bad guys are hot on the trail after them...... The old Chief's son, starts barkin' out orders to  all the members of the small band of "res jumpers" and they start hackin on sticks and putting them in the fire and then pull them out.................Now, the camp is  out on the flats you can see forever, as the bad guys come ridin' over a ridge (don't know where the ridge came from guesss they needed it for dramatics) well the bad guys put the brakes on their horses cause from about what appears to be 2 football fields distance they see about 25 Indians with what appears to be rifles......(actually they are the blackend' sticks made earlier..........."I thought you said they only had bows and arrows says one of the bad guys" the Irish dude says" they must have stolen those guns from white people"  at this point I'm beginnin' to "really dislike this guy"..........dammitt the Indians are gettin blamed for stealin' guns and they are standin' their ground with sticks..........

The bluff works and the bad guys ride off after tellin Mr. Ingels they are headed to the Army post to get a gattlin gun......... The Indians are fixin load up again and hit the trail North...............when the old Chief comes out of his lodge  walks off from the clan and starts singin' his "death songs".well a while later here come the bad guys with the really bad guys in blue uniforms................they ride up with gattlin gun  locked and loaded in the back of a wagon all of a sudden what do they see. the doc and Ingels standing in front of the chiefs funeral Pire'........"Where are those heathen savages?" barks the bad guy.............."In the mountains by this time" replies Ingel "well, let's get after them" says the bad guy............."whoa up there" says the yankee commander..........."gattlin guns are only to our advantage in the open..............in the mountains the Indians would have the advantage especially with as many guns as you reported them to have and besides my misses is fixin kidney pie for supper and I plan on livin' to eat it" (hee hee they were blackened sticks)...........

Now ,I have "purt neer" played the  entire episode back for ya'll....... what's the point right???????????  Ok, here is the point (s).................For years I have been sayin' that  blacks are not the most repressed, subjugated  and misrepresented of  allAmericans in history of this nation. The Indian was and still is!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Next point is, I have  for at least the last 4 years been (I guess) preachin to the  choir  that the American  Indian has been joined by yet another large cross section of the American population in regards to bein' treated unequal............. that would be SOUTHRONS.........Point three...I keep on sayin if we could join the numbers of both groups we would at least have a  better chance in protecting what little is left of our heritages..............I can not be the only human bein' on this earth that thinks that way.............so why hasn't it occured? (Mistrust on both sides would be my guess)........and a damn shame too..............maybe one of these days both groups will work together for the betterment of all like they did durin the War  of 1861-65... Other lesser points from the show and this post as well.............Even in the  decedance of the  1970 and 80's you could still find family programs on TV.........(now you can still find them but the are from another point in time)............ another lesser point..............Both Indians and Confederates have been documented   using "Quaker weapons" sucessfully against the larger forces of the Federal army thus not only demonstrating their cunning and bravery, but their resourcefullness against the odds as well .(pretty fair lesson to remember there)..........

Outside of my God,  my family and my heritage take presedence over all other worldly matters.............Perhaps I have less material things than most.  You will get little argument there from me. But , my heart and soul is fuller than most rich men I know, and probably richer than those I don't know  too!

I haven't forgotten where and from who I came from...........I  know where I am goin' cause I know where I've been........... Have you forgotten???????? I haven't!!! I hope this post has jogged a few memories in the right manner.

Blessin's to all here.

T.

Hey all,

Another Thanksgiving has come and gone, and I am left with a few thoughts floatin' round in my head. I'm old enough to remember when this holiday really meant something in America, other than the start of the Christmas shopping season.  I fear those days are long past, and I seriously doubt they will ever be back. I remember bein a kid in grade school, and there would always be the annual school play,it was the one time a year it was  "acceptable cool" to be Indian here in the midwest.(well mixblood anyway).........and I was always sure the part was mine. lol.....  I can still see my classmates in construction paper Pilgrim costumes. Fortunately for me, we had Res' connections and I didn't get stuck wearin' some hokie  classroom interpretation of how Indians dress paper costume. Of course my stuff was Southwestern and didn't accurately represent the  appropriate East Coast tribal clothing; but, I meant no disrespect and at least my stuff was real.  Thanksgivin', (at least when I was young) was the one time a year, that it was easier to capture teachers and classmates attention, and try and share what Thanksgivin' really meant to the Indian peoples.  Of course the true picture wasn't near as romantic in thinkin' to them, and it was very rare that I actually got the point accross, but, I tried nonetheless !

Thanksgivin' also meant family time, something that was always special to me. My grandaddys, my daddy, brother and I would do that rabitt huntin' thing in the chill of the early mornin' hours, and get home just in time to for a big gatherin' of the families(red and white alike) and the  wonderful smell of all kinds of different foods mixin' in the air as we walked in the house. Someone would offer up Grace and we'd dig in (kid's always standing while  we ate) cause there were never enough chairs to go around. Lord if it were possible to go back to those magical times, (when my grandparents,  daddy , brother, countless aunts uncles, and cousins who have sinced passed on were still  alive) well, I'd absorb even more of it up in my memory banks than I did. I am most greatful that the 2 strokes I've had didn't erase those treasured times.

Those were differnt times than my children and grandchildren face today.  Days of livin' without locked doors, neighbors who were more like family than neighbors, schools where  truth was taught,(be it not all the truths) but far more than today, and schools where you could still pray, and be proud of your heritage and the individuality that came from that heritage.  I always felt I was double blessed in that area, though in truth it was more a curse. I never totally fit in either world (red or white), but rather somewhere in between.  I did give it my best shot though, and am quite proud to say today, I still do.

Basically the point of this site is to allow me the opportunity to honor my elders, share teachins'  and stories learned long ago, all the while still  trying to fight the good fight for not only all my ancestors, but for my children and their children, and hopefully they will carry on that tradition to their childrens children... it is the only hope our heritage has of survival..........

Blessin's to all,

T

ps.thanks to my "adopted brother" Clint for makin this site possible