Sage Spirit

            In James Merrell’s latest book Into the American Woods he provides a detailed and comprehensive look at the use of native and colonist go betweens on the Pennsylvania frontier in the colonial period.  His work serves as a refreshing and new perspective on the relationship between Pennsylvanians and their native neighbors.  By using negotiators as his primary means of explanation of that relationship he sheds new light on the intimate interaction between those intermediaries and their colonial or native constituents.  Merrell is interested in the intricacies of the similarities and disparities that the negotiators faced not only in their travels to and from the council fire but their adaptation of the methodologies used by their adversaries.  For Merrell there is a paradox in the fact that at these meetings the intermediaries experienced both their best performances and their worst disasters in terms of cultivating a peaceful relationship between the colonists and their Indian neighbors.

            Merrell explores several different aspects of the interaction between both the mediators and the Indians and Colonists themselves divulging both the similarities that united them in some ways as well as showcasing the great gulf of cultural and religious differences that stood between them.  He starts out by discussing the qualities that were sought by both sides in an ambassador.  In his exploration of the traits that were supposed to foster success he reveals some underlying reasons for their failure like their inability to understand either side of the negotiations clearly.  Merrell also explains to the reader where these representatives were found geographically and how different groups like missionaries and natives who had either lived among the colonists or vice versa fell in or out of favor with the colonials and Indians respectively.  He then discusses their interaction with the woods and explains why it is a key to understanding each group’s larger ideal of their roles as intermediaries.  The woods seem to take on a life of their own for Merrell, by molding relationships through the hardships that they created in terms of the travel for the intermediaries.  Merrell also spends a good deal of time discussing the use of different methodologies of communication among the Indian and colonials and how the use of these media evolved and changes over time but the threads of consistency remained intact even though wampum or paper may have fallen from favor in the negotiating council.  Merrell explains the incompetence that often characterized the use of either wampum or paper or even the words conveyed by translators.  He is effective in conveying not only the problems encountered by the negotiators in their attempts to communicate, both logistical and philosophically, as well as their ability to adopt the methodologies of the other in order to further the negotiation process and the incompetence that often characterized the delivery of those media.  In the final section of the book Merrell discusses the spectacle that would often occur when these two diverse and disparate groups came together.  Merrell creates for the reader a vivid picture of the council meetings and the cacophony of dress and culture that ensued which was indeed another obstacle to the peace process and the negotiation of treaties as well as the logistical challenges that bringing thousands of people together, feeding and lodging them created.

            I found that the author’s lack of development of the racial ideology of the colonists to be the biggest area of opportunity for the work.  Merrell goes to great trouble to take his reader through the details of the dissolution of the negotiators efficiency in bridging the gap between the world of the colonists and their Indian neighbors but he never develops the continuum of racial discourse among the colonists that he exposes but never attempts to explain in his analysis.  It seems relatively evident that the pattern Merrell exposes show the evolution of colonial opinions and attitudes from one of a paternalistic protectionism of the Indians to that of resentfulness and distrust based on racist stereotypes among the colonists.  Clearly, by the time full fledged war does erupt in the 1750’s it demonstrates that both colonists and Indians alike had developed a mutual distrust and were violently acting out on transgressions, either real or perceived, that had been occurring for some time.  In that respect Merrell’s argument, although extremely persuasive and well organized, lacks the impact that it might have he included a more analytical approach in his book.  Although he does touch on this development in the last chapter of the book he fails to tie it in effectively with the remainder of his work. His sources are impeccable and the scope of information that he conveys is both admirable as well as ambitious.  He incorporates quite successfully the points of view of the natives and the colonists without favoring one or the other which is admirable.

            The most captivating part of Merrell’s work is his relation of the story of the brutality of Conestoga in 1758. This story encapsulates the paradox that was the process and tragedy of colonial negotiations with their Indian Neighbors.  Merrell explains to his reader the discovery among the charred remains of the murdered men, women and children there, of a bag containing two wampum belts and a treaty signed by William Penn in the “City of Brotherly Love” in 1701 bearing the promise that the colonists would, “shew themselves true Friends & Brothers to all & every one of ye Said Indians.”(p.288)  Merrell brilliantly brings his reader back to the realization that the peaceful relationship that once had been so successfully fostered by William Penn and his contemporaries at the edge of the woods with the council fire had degenerated into a hatred and brutality that up until that point in Pennsylvania’s history had been unmatched.

95. state law makes it illegal to harbor the Indians for amusement purposes- Roy Nash attempts to pass this

100. Bedell fights the tourist attractions because they are demeaning to the Indians- exhibit arts and crafts not people

105. the attractions were cultural tourism, their folk ways have a cash value

107. hard work is the rule among the Seminole

108. some observers in the 1930s felt that the acculturation was endangering the Seminole customs

109. members could be punished severely for deviation from the norm

110. during the decades that could have been disastrous for the Seminole they reaped the benefits of cultural tourism

111.Musa Isle and Coppingers close in the 1960s** where do they go?

112. in the 1950s the Seminole neared bankruptcy

113. federal recognition for the tribe came in 1957 after soliciting donations in 1956, 1962 Miccosukee Indians are recognized, new political divisions emerge several families try to break off

114. 1970s bring the cigarette shops and bingo- begin to assert sovereignty

115. James Billie is Chairman and advocate of Ecotourism

116. tribal dividend peaked at 2,000 per month

118.Miccousukee involved in the water regulation demanding higher standards