“Our people made it” Otoe-Missouria descendants welcomed back to Nebraska, 200 years after being forced out

Her tribe’s land stretched throughout southeastern Nebraska, from Yutan to the Salt Creek in Lincoln. They have been pressured out in 1833 to make means for white settlements, a few of which turned the concrete metropolis blocks of Lincoln and the College of Nebraska. Each at the moment are formally recognizing the injury carried out to Native individuals.

“I believe simply being right here, figuring out that [our ancestors] had tried to make sure a lot for us… That is simply an extension of that. And all of these teachings that they cross on to us, it actually means one thing,” Faw Faw mentioned.

The Otoe descendant made the journey to Lincoln, as the town’s mayor signed a proclamation designating September 21 as Otoe-Missouria Day. It’s the most recent step in a rising motion, in Nebraska and the world over, to acknowledge the hurt white settlers inflicted on Indigenous individuals and to reconcile relations.

For 189 years, the date marked the anniversary of the treaty that relinquished their lands to the U.S. authorities. Going ahead, Faw Faw mentioned the date will now be an annual celebration of her individuals and their persistence.