West Virginia University Peace Tree ceremony part of Indigenous People's Day
Oct. 10—MORGANTOWN — The Native American Studies Program held it's 31st annual Peace Tree ceremony at West Virginia University on Monday, as part of a series of events dedicated to honoring Indigenous People's Day.
Native American Studies Coordinator Bonnie Brown said this year's forum, titled This Land Was Already Loved, will be extra notable.
"What makes this year unprecedented and historic for the state of West Virginia is having this many leaders of the federally recognized tribes all come together in a public forum to speak about their ancestral connections to the land, to speak about how their people were here, what they endured during that era when settler colonialism was causing great harm to Native people," Brown said.
Faithkeeper Oren Lyons, of the Turtle Clan, later delivered a keynote speech as a continuation of the event. This Land Was Already Loved is scheduled to take place from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Tuesday.
The Peace Tree ceremony began in 1992, with the planting of a white pine tree. The initial ceremony marked 500 years since Christopher Columbus landed on the shores that were new to the Europeans but already loved by its existing inhabitants.
Although the original peace tree was chopped down by vandals once in its history, the ceremony nonetheless continues, next to another pine that grew to take the original's place. Gathered next to it on a blustery late morning on the WVU campus, Tadodaho Sidney Hill delivered the story of the peacemaker, who united warring Senecas, Cayuga, Oneida, Mohawk and Onondaga nations by planting the original Tree of Peace at Onondaga around 1000 A.D. The story comes from the Haudenosaunee oral tradition.
Later, the Tuscarora Nation joined the peace. These six nations became the Iroquois Confederacy. The tree was a living monument to that moment in history.
The tree today still holds significance for the present.
"Just look at the news," Hill said. "You see all the conflicts and people, we had prophecies that there would be so much war, so much ashes just flying everywhere. It's kind of what's happening today. We're always hoping for peace. Spread it as much as we can. Families and people all over the world."
What makes a ceremony like the peace tree especially significant on the same day as Columbus Day is that it is a reminder that Native Americans are not a people who only exist in the past. They survived, and continue to be part of the fabric of the nation.
Columbus Day itself is facing a critical reevaluation. Brown said that too many American kids go through school without ever reading or receiving education about contemporary Native peoples. They only see old sepia tone photos of people from the 1800s. However, there are 574 federally recognized Native nations in the U.S. today. There are 200 sovereign villages in Alaska and around 100 in southern California. More and more major municipalities are recognizing Indigenous People's day.
"So what is important is going forward, none of us can undo the past," Brown said. "What we can do is try to change the legacy for future generations by promoting truth, promoting justice and promoting self representation."
Olivia Robinson, a WVU freshman, stumbled upon the peace tree ceremony. She was on her way to pick up something from the university's Mountain Lair. The eagle that's part of the ceremony caught her eye, and she wandered over to the event. She had seen information about it in a brochure, but didn't think she was going to make it. She was glad she did. So much so that she's interested in taking a course through the Native American Studies program next semester.
Prior to stumbling across the ceremony, Oct. 9 held no special significance for her. The peace tree ceremony might change that, though.
"Yeah, I never really believed in Columbus Day once we got the history," Robinson said. "So I'm glad we reclaimed the day for indigenous people. This is a much better salvation of history than Columbus Day would ever be."
Reach Esteban at efernandez@timeswv.com
