TRIBES
Which group constituted one of the largest politically integrated tribes at the time of European colonization of the Americas?
Cherokee
What is the correct term for Native American Indians?
While “Native American,” “American Indian” and “Indigenous peoples” are acceptable and common terms used interchangeably, it’s best to refer to a group of people as their individual tribal name whenever possible. Always be sure to ask the individual about their preference.
When were Native Americans granted citizenship?
1924 (Less than 100 years ago)
On June 2, 1924, Congress enacted the Indian Citizenship Act, which granted citizenship to all Native Americans born in the U.S.
The right to vote however was barred by some states for decades, until the Voting Rights Act was passed in 1965.
True or False: The Navajo Nation has the largest tribal land in the United States.
On November 29, 1864, 675 Colorado volunteer soldiers attacked a federally declared tribe encampment, resulting in the death of approximately 230 people, mostly women and children. This event had a profound impact on US-Indian relations and the Cheyenne and Arapaho people.
The Sand Creek Massacre
What was the name of the confederation of five (later six) nations across upper New York state that played a strategic role in the struggle between the French and British for control of North America?
Iroquois.
These five tribes were: Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca. This diverse and influential group of Native people impacted the politics and history of their time. Their contributions to society and voices in media are still felt today.
______% of the world's agricultural crops were cultivated for millennia by Indigenous Americans pre European settlement.
60%
A lot of the domestication and breeding that resulted in today’s major food crops, the important initial work was done by Indigenous people.
These crops include tomatoes, hot chili peppers, potatoes, squash, beans, corn, and cacao.
Provoked by the Indian Removal Act of 1830; the forced migration journey, undertaken in the fall and winter of 1838–1839, fatal for one-fourth of the Cherokee population is known as _______________.
The Trail of Tears
True or False: Native Americans spoke as many as 500 languages prior to colonization of the Americas.
True.
However, many of these languages have disappeared as a result of assimilation policies by the government. In 1868, President Ulysses S. Grant declared, “In the difference of language today lies two-thirds of our trouble… their barbarous dialect should be blotted out and the English language substituted.”
What were the most prevalent Tribes that previously inhabited what is now known as Colorado?
The Ute, Cheyenne, Arapaho, Apache, Pueblo and Shoshone people.
Which people, guided by leaders such as Chochise and Geronimo, resisted white colonization of their homeland in the Southwest by both Spaniards and North American settlers for over 25 years?
The Apache People
What does the term "Federally Recognized Tribe" mean?
"Recognition" is a legal term meaning that the United States recognizes a government-to-government relationship with a Tribe and that a Tribe exists politically in a "domestic dependent nation" status. Federally recognized Tribes possess certain inherent powers of self-government and entitlement to certain federal benefits, services, and protections because of the special trust relationship.
Sitting Bull (1831-1890) was a Hunkpapa Lakota medicine man who became one of the most famous Native Americans in history because of his major victory at the _____________.
The Battle of Little Big Horn, better known as Custer’s Last Stand.
The United States Army was defeated by Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho Indians. The Natives were resisting demands made by the government to move to reservations.
True or False: There are 80 federally recognized tribes in the United States.
False.
There are 574 Federally Recognized Tribes as of 1/28/2022
True or False: There are 5 recognized Indian Reservations located throughout the state of Colorado.
False. There are only two Federally recognized reservations in Colorado to this day. The Southern Ute Tribe located in the southern most part of the state in Ignacio, Colorado. And the Ute Mountain Utes Tribe located in the four corners region of the state in Towaoc, Colorado.
Which Tribe played a crucial role as code talkers for the United States Government during WWII?
The Navajo people
They were a select group of volunteers who created an unbreakable secret code.
The government used this as a political tool for indigenous peoples to rely on them for survival. This brought an abundance of manufactured goods into the hands of Indigenous people, resulting in tremendous cultural changes in terms of dress, diet, decorative and artistic pursuits, and technology.
Annuities
A fixed sum of money or goods that the US government paid to Indigenous people for the sale of their lands. Treaties with Indigenous nations typically specified payment amounts over a period of years in return for land cessions.
Which American document holds multiple similarities to a document written by the Iroquois Confederacy in 1451, and was even said to be studied for inspiration by Benjamin Franklin.
The Declaration of Independence (1776)
Throughout history there have been links showing the Iroquois constitution laid a base for the American Constitution. Although there are many differences and similarities, both sets of constitutions had it in their seams to protect the government and keep the people at peace.
True or False: All Native American tribes have their own land.
False.
There are around 326 tribal land areas in the United States, compared to 574 federally-recognized tribes. Of the tribes that do have land, it is on average only about 2.6 percent as large as the territory they occupied before colonization. Many of the tribes who were forcibly relocated by the U.S. government were left without any land of their own.
About 1,400 years ago, long before Europeans explored North America, ancestral Pueblo peoples made ______________ their home. For more than 700 years they and their descendants lived and flourished here. Building elaborate stone communities in the sheltered alcoves of the canyon walls. Then, in the late A.D. 1200s, in the span of a generation or two, they left their homes and moved away.
Mesa Verde National Park preserves a spectacular reminder of this ancient culture. The park contains nearly 5,000 known archeological sites including cliff dwellings and the mesa top sites of pithouses, pueblos, masonry towers, and farming structures.
In 1868, the United States entered into The Fort Laramie Treaty which designated a large swath of lands west of the Missouri River, called the Black Hills as “unceded Indian Territory” for the exclusive use of native peoples. But when gold was found in the Black Hills, the United States reneged on the agreement, redrawing the boundaries of the treaty, and confining the _________ people, traditionally nomadic hunters, to a farming lifestyle on a reservation instead.
The Sioux and Arapaho Peoples
______ are an important Southwestern architectural form. ______ is a Hopi word used to refer to specialized ceremonial rooms in Pueblos. The Hopi's origin traditions tell that their ancestors climbed upward through underground chambers called _______.
Kivas
Education here was both academic and industrial. Graduates received the equivalent of an eighth-grade education and specialized trade skills that would theoretically enhance Indigenous livelihoods on and off the reservations; however, the broader purpose was the erasure of Indigenous culture, causing immense harm to Indigenous peoples’ ability to maintain their languages and customs.
Indian Boarding Schools
True or False: One in four American Indian women had been sterilized without her consent between 1973 and 1976.
True.
A study by the U.S. General Accounting Office finds that 4 of the 12 Indian Health Service regions sterilized 3,406 American Indian women without their permission between 1973 and 1976. The GAO finds that 36 women under age 21 were sterilized during this period.
This monumental time in 1800's Colorado history took 3.7 million acres of land from the Ute Reservation in Western Colorado and established many towns across the San Juan Mountains including Silverton.
Mineral and natural resource mining