My first Massachusetts trip was to Cape Cod for the Wampanoag powwow in Mashpee, an annual event (this year was the 103rd) held for three days the first week in July. I went on Sunday, the final day, and it was the biggest and best powwow I went to this summer. I stayed for the veterans’ dance, the tiny tots dance, and a few others, but the heat was pretty intense, even for me sitting in the shade–I could only imagine what it was like for the dancers, dressed in regalia, dancing in the full sun.

There was an excellent assortment of booths selling crafts and food, as well as a clambake the day I was there (for an extra fee). Several contests were scheduled later in the afternoon, including the crowning of the Powwow Princess and Little Miss Wampanoag, all of which I would have enjoyed on a cooler day.

The next day I headed over to the Mashpee Wampanoag Museum, a small museum that tells the history of the Wampanoag people up to the present. There are several video interviews of contemporary Wampanoags, emphasizing the vitality of the tribe and its efforts to preserve the culture. A woman named Courtney was working there that day, and she gave me a warm greeting and introduction to the museum. When I mentioned I had been at the powwow the day before, she told me proudly that her son had won the boys’ junior dance competition.

The museum taught me more about King Philip’s War. I vaguely knew this was part of Massachusetts history, but I learned that it was much larger and more wide-ranging than I was aware. Named for the Wampanoag chief and sachem Metacom, who also used the English name Philip, the war took place from 1675 to 1676. While it was devastating for the colonists, who saw 52 towns attacked and sometimes destroyed, losing 2,500 people, its impact was far worse for the Wampanoag, who lost most of their land and suffered twice as many deaths. Other tribes in the area also saw losses of people, land, and tribal identity. The American identity was born, though, since it was the first time the colonists had fought a war without any help from Europe. It was a devastating and far-reaching war with important consequences, and it’s surprising it isn’t taught more as part of history.

You know what is taught? The Pilgrim Plimoth narrative. If you grew up in Massachusetts, chances are you visited Plimoth Patuxet Museums, maybe on a third grade field trip. Known as Plimoth Plantation until 2020, the name change reflects an attempt to focus more on the Patuxet band of Wampanoag that lived in the area long before the English established the Plimoth colony.

I hadn’t visited in at least a decade, so I headed over one Sunday morning in July. The Wampanoag village there includes a wetu, a canoe, a garden, and a cooking area, but I was surprised not to see any costumed interpreters there, since there were several dressed as English colonists in the Plimoth part. I asked a staff person about it, and she said they were working on getting costumes, which seemed odd to me since the Wampanoag village has been there for more than 40 years.

Back home, I did some research and discovered that the Wampanoag tribe has cut ties with Plimoth Patuxet due to a lack of Native American staffing and input and neglect in the upkeep of the Wampanoag village. From the introductory film to the separate gift shop for Native American items to the website that mostly features photos from the Plimoth part of Plimoth Patuxet, it seems like the 17th-century English village and Mayflower replica are still the main focus, despite the name change.

On the way home, I stopped in central Massachusetts to attend the powwow held by the Hassanamisco band of the Nipmuc Nation. When my daughter was in high school, she made an oral history video of this tribe for her Girl Scout Gold Award project. She interviewed the former and current chiefs of the tribe, and we visited the reservation a couple of times, which is a three-and-a-half acre parcel of land in Grafton, Massachusetts. Unfortunately, their petition for federal recognition was denied in 2004, but the band has 600 members and works hard to preserve their history and culture.

I had plans to go to the Abenaki Heritage Weekend in Vermont at the end of June, but it didn’t work out for me, so I don’t have any travel reports from Vermont. I do want to mention one bit of controversy around the Vermont Abenaki that has to do with children’s literature, specifically author and storyteller Joseph Bruchac. I know only the smallest amount about this issue, so I encourage you to do your own research, but apparently there have been some questions about the Abenaki heritage of Vermont tribes, which has in turn led to questions about Joseph Bruchac’s Native ancestry. Dr. Debbie Reese, a noted scholar of Native Americans in children’s literature, has written a post about this on her blog, in which she concludes that she can no longer recommend books by him, his sons, or his sister, Marge Bruchac. Since the Bruchacs have made substantial contributions to Native American children’s literature, this is a pretty serious statement for her to make. I urge you to read about it and decide for yourself.

Books About Indigenous People of Massachusetts

Colonization and the Wampanoag Story by Linda Coombs (Crown Books for Young Readers, 2023)

Keepunumuk: Weeâchumun’s Thanksgiving Story by Danielle Greendeer, Anthony Perry, and Alexis Bunten illustrated by Garry Meeches Sr. (Charlesbridge, 2022)

If You Lived During the Plimoth Thanksgiving by Chris Newell, illustrated by Winona Nelson (Scholastic, 2021)

Tribes

Massachusetts

Chaubunagungamaug Band of Nipmuck*

Hassanamisco Nipmuc*

Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe

Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah)

Vermont

Elnu Abenaki Tribe*

Koasek Abenaki Tribe*

Missiquoi Abenaki Tribe*

Nulhegan Band of the Coosuk Abenaki Nation*

*Not federally-recognized

Reservations and Trust Lands

Massachusetts

Chaubunagungamaug Reservation (located in CT, but affiliated with the Chaubunagungamaug Band of Nipmucks in Massachusetts)

Hassanamisco Reservation

Wampanoag-Aquinnah Trust Land

As my summer was wrapping up, I came across a book that felt like the perfect coda to my travels. Kindred Spirits: Shilombish Ittibachvffa by Leslie Stall Widener, illustrated by Johnson Yazzie (Charlesbridge, 32 pages) tells the story of the bond between the Choctaw Nation and the people of Ireland. During the Irish Potato Famine, the Choctaw Nation heard about the Irish people’s plight. Knowing what it was like to lose your home and to not have enough to eat, the Choctaw people collected $170 (about $5,000 in today’s dollars) and sent it to Ireland to help provide help to the Irish people. Almost 200 years later, when the Irish learned how the Navajo and Hopi people had been devastated by Covid-19, 26,000 of them donated to a relief fund, many of them citing the Choctaw contribution to Ireland back in 1847.

Sometimes a group of people can seem like just a name in a history book, but this story reminds me how learning about another culture helps us to recognize our common humanity. I’m grateful for the opportunity I had this summer to travel to places where, even though I might have been there before, I learned to see them in new ways. I got to witness resilient groups preserving their cultures despite formidable odds that have been stacked against them for centuries.

If you want to learn more about indigenous people and history in your area, you can start with Powwows.com to search for powwows and other Native American events in the U.S. and Canada. Google “Native American museums near me” to find places to visit and to take your kids. Read some of the books from my Indigenous Americans book list that include stories of Native people all over North America. And please let me know if these posts wind up inspiring you to do your own travels!

I started my time in Maine at the Wells Beach Powwow. Although it was held in Maine, this event was sponsored by the New Hampshire Intertribal Native American Council, and most of the participants were from New Hampshire. I recommend attending any powwow if you have the opportunity, since it’s a unique way to witness contemporary Native culture.

The powwows I went to opened in the morning, with booths selling art, crafts, and food. Dancing began at noon with the Grand Entry, in which all the dancers and flag bearers entered the powwow ring, usually with the American flag, tribal flags, and maybe a POW flag. The Wampanoag powwow I attended had a drum roll call, with the four drumming groups each playing a solo before the dancing began. After the Grand Entry, there’s a dance honoring veterans and their families. Then there might be dances for children, dances for elders, dance competitions, a blanket dance to raise money, and dances in which everyone is invited to join the circle.

I found it helpful to learn some powwow etiquette before I attended. There will likely be a master of ceremonies who may go over some rules about taking pictures, when to stand or sit, who can join various dances, and more. I felt that the powwows were really more for the participants than the audience, and I’ve opted not to post photos here.

Although I only made it to three powwows this summer, there were a number of others held in all the New England states. I recommend Powwows.com to find one near you. If you’re in New England, the Massachusetts Center for Native American Awareness (MCNAA) has a calendar that includes powwows and other Native events from all around New England.

From Wells, I drove up to Bar Harbor to visit the Abbe Museum, which turned out to be one of my favorites. Founded in 1926 by physician and summer Maine resident Dr. Robert Abbe, it became a Smithsonian affiliate in 2013 and has increasingly sought Native American collaboration and involvement. While I recommend paying admission and enjoying all the exhibits, there’s a room at the entrance that’s free. It includes excellent information on all of the Maine tribes, a good explanation of federal recognition of tribes, and an introduction to the decolonized approach the Abbe takes to presenting indigenous history.

From there, I headed north to visit the Penobscot Nation, about 60 miles from Bar Harbor. I’ve been curious about this since I read the novel in verse Rez Dogs by Joseph Bruchac. It’s about a girl quarantining during Covid-19 with her grandparents on what is called the Penacook reservation, but which I think is modeled on the Penobscot one. I drove around the reservation a bit, then headed a few miles down the road to the Hudson Museum on the campus of the University of Maine in Orono. Admission is free, with two excellent but quite distinct galleries. One is about the five Maine Wabanaki tribes (Abenaki, Maliseet, Micmac, Passamaquoddy, and Penobscot), and the other looks at world cultures from different perspectives like food, clothing, and sacred practices, with artifacts from all over the world.

One excellent exhibit in the Wabanaki gallery is about basketry, focusing on the ash and sweetgrass baskets that are one of the best-known forms of Wabanaki art, now threatened by an invasive beetle that kills ash trees. Despite this, the baskets on display are a testament to the continuity of this art form to the present day. The First Blades of Sweetgrass by Suzanne Greenlaw is an excellent picture book about a contemporary basket maker passing along this art form to her granddaughter.

My last stop as I headed for home was the Mt. Kearsarge Indian Museum in Warner, NH. This museum was founded by Charles “Bud” Thompson, a white man who died in 2021 at the age of 99. From childhood, he was fascinated by Native Americans and collected artifacts from all over the country. As I mentioned previously, I preferred the museums that focus on local tribes and cultures, and that have ownership or strong input from members of those tribes. I found those museums in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Maine, which, not coincidentally, are the New England states with federally recognized tribes.

Books about indigenous people of Maine

Rez Dogs by Joseph Bruchac (Dial Books, 2021)

The First Blades of Sweetgrass: A Native American Story by Suzanne Greenlaw and Gabriel Frey, illustrated by Nancy Baker (Tilbury House Publishers, 2021)

Books about powwows

Bowwow Powwow by Brenda J. Child, translation by Gordon Jourdain, illustrations by Jonathan Thunder (Minnesota Historical Society, 2018)

Josie Dances by Denise Lajimodiere, illustrations by Angela Erdrich (Minnesota Historical Society, 2021)

Ancestor Approved: Intertribal Stories for Kids edited by Cynthia Leitich Smith (Heartdrum, 2021)

Powwow Day by Traci Sorell, illustrated by Madelyn Goodnight (Charlesbridge, 2022)

Finding My Dance by Ria Thundercloud, illustrated by Kalila J. Fuller (Penguin Workshop, 2022)

Tribes

Maine

Houlton Band of Maliseet Indians

Mi’kmaq Nation

Passamaquoddy Tribe

Penobscot Nation

Reservations and Trust Lands

Maine

Indian Township Reservation/Passamaquoddy

Pleasant Point Reservation

Mi’kmaq Nation Trust Land

Passamaquoddy Land Trust

Penobscot Land Trust