Lewis and Clark Through Indian Eyes 
asked by librarian on November 20, 2006 12:30 AM
For the first time in the two hundred years since Lewis and Clark led their expedition from St. Louis to the Pacific, we hear the other side of the story—as we listen to nine descendants of the Indians whose homelands were traversed.
Among those who speak: Newspaper editor Mark Trahant writes of his childhood belief that he was descended from Clark and what his own research uncovers. Award-winning essayist and fiction writer Debra Magpie Earling describes the tribal ways that helped her nineteenth-century Salish ancestors survive, and that still work their magic today. Montana political figure Bill Yellowtail tells of the efficiency of Indian trade networks, explaining how axes that the expedition traded for food in the Mandan and Hidatsa villages of Kansas had already arrived in Nez Perce country by the time Lewis and Clark got there a few months and 1,000 miles later. Umatilla tribal leader Roberta Conner compares Lewis and Clark’s journal entries about her people with what was actually going on, wittily questioning Clark’s notion that the natives believed the white men “came from the clouds”—in other words, they were gods. Writer and artist N. Scott Momaday ends the book with a moving tribute to the “most difficult of journeys,” calling it, in the truest sense, for both the men who entered the unknown and those who watched, “a vision quest,” with the “visions gained being of profound consequence.”
Some of the essays are based on family stories, some on tribal or American history, still others on the particular circumstances of a tribe today—but each reflects the expedition’s impact through the prism of the author’s own, or the tribe’s, point of view.
Thoughtful, moving, provocative, Lewis and Clark Through Indian Eyes is an exploration of history—and a study of survival—that expands our knowledge of our country’s first inhabitants. It also provides a fascinating and invaluable new perspective on the Lewis and Clark expedition itself and its place in the long history of our continent.
Reviews
0%
0%
Most good ideas are simple, and, as the title of this book suggests, it is a simple collection of some extremely profound ruminations by Native Americans on the acts and impact of the Lewis and Clark expedition.
Nine extremely well educated authors were asked to address the effects of the Corps of Discovery for its bicentennial. They are not representative of the man in the street. They may, however, have captured the essence of feeling and sense of the collective beings of the many tribes whose lives were impacted forever, and give a foreboding of what manifest destiny may mean in the 21st century.
We learn facts, Sacagawea was not her name, she was not Shoshone, the natives shared their wives with the expedition, the Crows stole the Expedition horses and out traded Lewis and Clark by selling them nags, that the tribes knew of both oceans, had seen and dealt with Americans, Spanish, English and French before, that at least one of the tribes had sent emissaries to the east coast around the time of the American Revolution, and that Lewis and Clark, in reality, traveled fairly well known and used paths to the Pacific Ocean and back with the assistance of a multitude of tribes who fed and guided them. Although the natives viewed such a journey as difficult, there were regular trade routes established along much of Corps' path.
We learn too of the relationship of the "Corps of Discovery" to the doctrine of discovery that held the "civilized" countries could lay claim to all they discovered. Part of Jefferson's plan was to cement the United States' claim to the Louisiana Purchase. At least one tribe had to forcefully civilize the Corps when its members entered the homes of the tribe uninvited seeking food. After the starving Corps was reprimanded and made its apologies, it was fed.
We can also learn much of the Native American concept of God and the misinformation in Lewis and Clark's journals. The journal's report one tribe was a sun worshiping tribe when it was the custom of the tribe to worship the Great Spirit by facing toward the rising sun in the morning much as Muslim face Mecca. The sense of spirituality and connection with the land coursing through the various essays is the book's most powerful aspect.
We learn too of the absurdity of the "Great Father" in Washington concept. Though the eyes of hindsight, we all to clearly see how the lives of hundreds of thousands of courageous souls were lost by the "Great Father's" promises of help and threats of death to those who would not accept.
Cynics amongst us may see some parallel to the current conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq in which the Great White Father seeks to help the people to his way of life that he knows is best for them. Our manifest destiny now seems to be to force our way of life on Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Korea, at least.
None of the authors addressed this 21st century vision of manifest destiny, but none embraced what the white man did to their ancestors and their way of life. Perhaps more could be learned and more might be said. More harm has been done by those who say they are there to help than those who outright admit they are enemies.
I am no Lewis and Clark scholar. However, any thinking person interested in both sides of the story will find this collection of essays provocative and probative of the lessons of our past that have important application to our present.
© Hamilton D. Moore
Nine extremely well educated authors were asked to address the effects of the Corps of Discovery for its bicentennial. They are not representative of the man in the street. They may, however, have captured the essence of feeling and sense of the collective beings of the many tribes whose lives were impacted forever, and give a foreboding of what manifest destiny may mean in the 21st century.
We learn facts, Sacagawea was not her name, she was not Shoshone, the natives shared their wives with the expedition, the Crows stole the Expedition horses and out traded Lewis and Clark by selling them nags, that the tribes knew of both oceans, had seen and dealt with Americans, Spanish, English and French before, that at least one of the tribes had sent emissaries to the east coast around the time of the American Revolution, and that Lewis and Clark, in reality, traveled fairly well known and used paths to the Pacific Ocean and back with the assistance of a multitude of tribes who fed and guided them. Although the natives viewed such a journey as difficult, there were regular trade routes established along much of Corps' path.
We learn too of the relationship of the "Corps of Discovery" to the doctrine of discovery that held the "civilized" countries could lay claim to all they discovered. Part of Jefferson's plan was to cement the United States' claim to the Louisiana Purchase. At least one tribe had to forcefully civilize the Corps when its members entered the homes of the tribe uninvited seeking food. After the starving Corps was reprimanded and made its apologies, it was fed.
We can also learn much of the Native American concept of God and the misinformation in Lewis and Clark's journals. The journal's report one tribe was a sun worshiping tribe when it was the custom of the tribe to worship the Great Spirit by facing toward the rising sun in the morning much as Muslim face Mecca. The sense of spirituality and connection with the land coursing through the various essays is the book's most powerful aspect.
We learn too of the absurdity of the "Great Father" in Washington concept. Though the eyes of hindsight, we all to clearly see how the lives of hundreds of thousands of courageous souls were lost by the "Great Father's" promises of help and threats of death to those who would not accept.
Cynics amongst us may see some parallel to the current conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq in which the Great White Father seeks to help the people to his way of life that he knows is best for them. Our manifest destiny now seems to be to force our way of life on Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Korea, at least.
None of the authors addressed this 21st century vision of manifest destiny, but none embraced what the white man did to their ancestors and their way of life. Perhaps more could be learned and more might be said. More harm has been done by those who say they are there to help than those who outright admit they are enemies.
I am no Lewis and Clark scholar. However, any thinking person interested in both sides of the story will find this collection of essays provocative and probative of the lessons of our past that have important application to our present.
© Hamilton D. Moore
reviewed by nat on November 25, 2006 4:45 PM
0%
0%
It is clear from Undaunted Courage or any version of the Journals that L&C could not have survived without the constant gracious help of Indians (which is what they call themselves in this book). The painful historical irony is clear without reading the book, especially with the Nez Perce (who kept the expedition from starving when the tribe could have killed L&C and taken their weapons, and who were chased out of their country a few decades later by U.S. troops). What is interesting in this book is how the various authors address this issue in the 21st century. There are passages about how the Indians must have viewed L&C at the time, but not much new. Various tribes are represented, and they have their own views on Sacajawea. The concept of the book was good, and there some are very good parts, but overall it's not compelling writing or reading. If the purpose was to record these views in a book, whether compelling or not, then it serves its purpose.
reviewed by freedrink on November 27, 2006 1:53 PM
0%
0%
Plenty of history books tell the Lewis and Clark expedition story from different angles; but here for the first time is the other side of the story from nine descendants of the Native Americans whose homelands were traversed by the two intrepid explorers. From a newspaper editor who writes of his childhood belief he was descended from Clark to essays which reveal family encounters, tribal law, or the expedition's long impact on tribes today, Lewis And Clark Through Indian Eyes provides an impressively wide-ranging set of essays charting more than just their journeys.
reviewed by nutshell on November 27, 2006 4:21 PM
0%
0%
Only a man of the lifelong sense of fairness and perspective of Alvin Josephy could have had the idea of letting Indian historians weigh in on such a momentous event. Alvin Josephy's intimate association with these writers gives the title of editor way more weight that it would normally get. This is a very important book, the last effort of a historian committed to the Indian side of the story. He lived to finish it--as he lived to understand and tell the Indian story. I am personally proud to have worked with and know Mr. Josephy for many years and I hope this book inspires young people to seek the other side of the story.
reviewed by orla on November 27, 2006 11:10 PM
0%
0%
This is an important book. In 2001, I asked a Hidatsa woman working on the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial effort about sources concerning the Native American view of Lewis and Clark. She answered that there wasn't a source. Further, she said that no one person could write such a book. The tribes with whom Lewis and Clark made contact were different in many ways; including their forms of government and how they lived their lives. Her words were certainly true. That this book contains essays by nine authors having different tribal backgrounds is a long step in the right direction. Certainly there are tribes and bands not represented; notably, the Blackfeet Nation is missing. Further, because the editor properly chose to accept the essays "unfiltered," the reader has to adapt from one essay to the next. However, the book is easy reading.
Precisely because nine essays were necessary, it is dangerous to generalize the content of this book. Several of the authors admire the people of the Lewis and Clark Expedition but conclude that the outcome was no big deal. The European diseases preceded Lewis and Clark and the hordes of non-Indians that followed Lewis and Clark would have come anyway. Almost every tribe had significant contact or knowledge of white people prior to Lewis and Clark. They were aware of how the whites had treated Indian tribes in the eastern United States. A common theme reiterated by nearly every author is that their people have always been here and will always be here. The broken treaties, removal from homelands, lost population, distribution of reservation lands to whites, and poverty brought about by the European invaders are deplored; but the writers see hope in the Indian accomplishments and resurgence of pride during recent years.
The authors of these essays are writers, historians, and tribal executives. Each identifies his or her self with a tribe or combination of tribes. However, nearly all have lived much of their lives away from the reservations and have achieved success in "white society." After considerable thought, I decided that this was the proper choice. The vast majority of non-Indians like myself are so ignorant of Indian history and thought that we need an "interpreter." Who better than someone who has stood in both camps. Be forewarned, the introduction of this book is terrible. It is inaccurate, condescending, and unnecessarily contradicts material in the essays. If you have any interest in Lewis and Clark, history, or those Americans we often call Indian; read this book. Discount the introduction and read the essays twice.
Precisely because nine essays were necessary, it is dangerous to generalize the content of this book. Several of the authors admire the people of the Lewis and Clark Expedition but conclude that the outcome was no big deal. The European diseases preceded Lewis and Clark and the hordes of non-Indians that followed Lewis and Clark would have come anyway. Almost every tribe had significant contact or knowledge of white people prior to Lewis and Clark. They were aware of how the whites had treated Indian tribes in the eastern United States. A common theme reiterated by nearly every author is that their people have always been here and will always be here. The broken treaties, removal from homelands, lost population, distribution of reservation lands to whites, and poverty brought about by the European invaders are deplored; but the writers see hope in the Indian accomplishments and resurgence of pride during recent years.
The authors of these essays are writers, historians, and tribal executives. Each identifies his or her self with a tribe or combination of tribes. However, nearly all have lived much of their lives away from the reservations and have achieved success in "white society." After considerable thought, I decided that this was the proper choice. The vast majority of non-Indians like myself are so ignorant of Indian history and thought that we need an "interpreter." Who better than someone who has stood in both camps. Be forewarned, the introduction of this book is terrible. It is inaccurate, condescending, and unnecessarily contradicts material in the essays. If you have any interest in Lewis and Clark, history, or those Americans we often call Indian; read this book. Discount the introduction and read the essays twice.
reviewed by bestseller on November 28, 2006 1:35 AM