James M. McClurken

James M. McClurken is an ethnohistorian specializing in Great Lakes Native Americans in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He has published numerous books on North American Indian history and t...

Our People, Our Journey
The Little River Ottawa Band of Indians

James M. McClurken

Winner: 2010 Michigan Notable Book Award

Winner: 2009 Michigan Historical Society State History Award

Our People, Our Journey is a landmark history of the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians, a Michigan tribe that has survived to the present day despite the expansionist and assimilationist policies that nearly robbed it of an identity in the late nineteenth century.

In his thoroughly researched chronicle, McClurken documents in words and images every major lineage and family of the Little River Ottawas. He describes the Band's struggles to find land to call its own over several centuries, including the hardships that began with European exploration of what is now the upper Midwest. Although the Little River Ottawas were successful at integrating their economic and cultural practices with those of Europeans, they were forced to cede land in the face of American settlements.

McClurken explains how the Little River Band was forced, in 1858, onto a reservation on the Pere Marquette and Manistee Rivers where they settled with a number of other Ottawa bands. However, the very treaty intended to provide the Grand River Ottawas with a permanent reservation "homeland" eventually allowed non-Indians to acquire title to nearly two-thirds of the land within the reservation by 1880.

CONTENTS:

List of Illustrations
In Memory of Margaret Chandler
Preface
Land beneath the Trees
Introduction: The Analytical Paradigm
Chapter 1. When the Europeans Came
Chapter 2. Kinsmen and Confederates
Chapter 3. Coexistence and Conquest
Chapter 4. The Will of the Grand Council
Chapter 5. "Civilizing” the Ottawas
Chapter 6. "Strong Titles" and the Government "Swan"
Chapter 7. "Not a Tent, a Wigwam, nor a Camp Fire..."
Chapter 8. New Communities, Established Leaders
Chapter 9. A "Great Excitement among the Indians"
Chapter 10. Accidents of History
Chapter 11. The Opposite of Intentions
Chapter 12. The Council of Ogemuk
Chapter 13. On the Outskirts
Chapter 14. Teaching the Children
Chapter 15. A Small Victory
Chapter 16. Community Councils to Business Committees
Chapter 17. A Desperate Decade
Chapter 18. New Deal, Renewed Hope
Chapter 19. No One’s Responsibility
Chapter 20. The Whole of the Holst Report
Chapter 21. "Indian Problems"
Chapter 22. "An 'Advocate' and 'Attorney for the People'"
Chapter 23. Decades of Success and Political Evolution
Chapter 24. Distinct, Separate, and Sovereign
Chapter 25. Constructing a New Government
Chapter 26. An Ancient Community, a New Century
Index of Tribal Councils and Ogemas since Reaffirmation (1994)
List of Abbreviations Used in the Notes and References
Notes
References
Index