More than 100 people signed on for an internet videoconference with the chairman and vice chairwoman of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe, Cedric Cromwell and Jessie Little Doe Baird, Monday afternoon.
The Wampanoag Tribal Council, the Gay Head Taxpayers Association, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the town of Gay Head signed formal settlement papers in the Indian land claim suit last weekend.
The signings represent a major step toward final accord in the suit that has divided the town for nine years.
The first powwow to be held on Gay Head since the days of King Philip took place in that town last night, and the flavor and spirit of those ancient days was revived so far as possible when Lorenzo Jeffers was made chief of the tribe. Dressed in full Indian regalia, with a war bonnet on his head, but unaccompanied by the sound of the war drums or the spectacle of Indians dancing in the flickering flames of a bonfire, Rev. Leonard C.
We are members of the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah). Wampanoag means “People of the First Light.” Aquinnah means “Land under the Hill.” We have survived on Noepe, “land amid the waters,” members of the Algonquin Nation and Eastern Woodland Indians.
As Gay Head entered the 1900s, it was one of the newest towns in the commonwealth. The English settlers at first considered it part of Chilmark, then decreed it an Indian district from 1855 to 1870, and finally granted it legal independence as the town of Gay Head in 1870. In creating the town, the legislature permitted tribal members of the place they called Aquinnah to divide their land severally and establish a town meeting form of government. To start its life as an incorporated town in the commonwealth of Massachusetts, the state gave Gay Head a treasury of $2.68.
To assure that the identity of the Vineyard’s Indians, their history, culture and tribal lands will be preserved, a Wampanoag Tribal Council of Gay Head was organized on Saturday, and Mrs. James R. Gentry elected its president.
Lorenzo Jeffers, descendant of Mittark, the last Island Indian chief, was duly elected chief of his tribe at a meeting held at Gay Head last week. The occasion of this election of a chief was the organizing of the tribe in order to gain representation in the Wampanoag Council, in which all the southern New England tribes with their branches were represented at a kindling of the council brand at Mashpee a couple of weeks ago, the first time that the Wampanoags have assembled in tribal council for 200 years.
A collection of old documents dating far back in the last century has been unearthed in the old Jeffers house at Gay Head by Lorenzo D. Jeffers, the present owner of the estate of his ancestors. These documents consist of letters, ledgers, bills and notations kept by Thomas Jeffers, grandfather of the present owner.
The Gay Head Indians were visited last Friday by the Hon. Rodney French, chairman on the part of the House of Representatives of the Indian Committee. The chieftains of the tribe assembled in council at 10 o’clock of the day above named, and expressed their opinion on the proposed questions of enfranchisement, &c.
Mr. Zaccheus Howwaswee, expressed his opinion in favor of remaining in their present condition.
