The Original People

The Original People. . , The Potawatomi Nation , The Potawatomi are a tribe of Native Americans with historical settlements that extended through the Great Lakes in the present states of Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, and Wisconsin. The Potawatomi are a proud and successful people who peacefully co-existed with the area's early settlers., An Ideal Place To Live , The St. Joseph River Valley was an ideal location in which to live for the Potawatomi. There was an abundance of white-tailed deer, elk, turkey, fish, ducks, geese, and edible nuts and berries. Materials for building their homes, known as wigwamen, were plentiful. At their back door was a haven for wildlife, known as the Grand Kankakee Marsh. It was one of the largest and most fertile wetlands east of the Mississippi, starting on the southwest side of South Bend, and extending all the way to the Illinois border., A Sad Development , Regrettably, in 1838, most of the Potawatomi were forcibly marched to Kansas. This forced removal is known as the Trail of Death, in remembrance of those who perished during the journey. Fortunately, the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi, through the efforts of their leader, Chief Leopold Pokagon, was able to negotiate with the government and was allowed to stay in the Territory of Michigan., A Sight To Behold , Imagine this… you are transported back in time 200 years ago, gazing upon the St. Joseph River. What would you see and feel? Fast-flowing, crystal-clear water that is cool to the touch. The pebbly bottom of the river can easily be seen, even through 30 feet of water. That's what the Potawatomi saw, who knew the river as "znathwen zibé", or "a difficult current". Other wonders would have caught your attention: enormous trees lining the river banks, osprey and bald eagles seen hunting the waters for its abundance of fish, playful otters frolicking near the shoreline, and riverbank lodges that served as homes to beavers., A Native American Highway , Picture yourself in a world where there are no cars, trains, or planes. How would you get from one place to another? For the Potawatomi, the answer was our waterways. They relied on the St. Joseph and its tributaries to travel long distances. Using their "thiman"- the Potawatomi word for canoe-they traveled from one river to the next, stopping and carrying their canoes when needed. This allowed them to travel from one part of the country to another, going as far away as Canada and the Gulf of Mexico.