Rip Russell studying his lines for Squatters on Red Earth. Photo credit: Mary Swander...
In the early settlement days in the United States, the federal government told the Indigenous people “to root or die.” The government had little tolerance for hunters and gathers. They wanted everyone to live on small parcels of land, stay there, and be “productive.” Get with the system: capitalism, colonialism, and private property. With the 1887 Dawes Act, alone, the Indigenous people lost 90 million acres of their land. The people were shunted off to reservations, their children sent to boarding schools to become “farmers.”
That’s right. The U.S. didn’t think the Indigenous people farmed. If they did, they didn’t know how to do it right. First of all, they didn’t plow the soil. They merely pushed the seeds into the moist river banks with a stick. Good grief, you had to plow.
The government was ignoring the fact that the Indigenous people had a sophisticated, ecologically sound system of agriculture. They were practicing methods we think we have only recently discovered like no-till, permaculture, companion planting, herbal pesticides and herbicides, dehydration and sophisticated food preservation and storage.
Many Indigenous women farmed. That was all wrong. Men should farm, the women should sit and do needlework. The government was determined to teach young Indigenous boys to farm, and the girls to knit. They took away their clothes, cut their hair and forbid them to speak their native languages.
Of course, there was tension.
For the last couple of years, I researched the mindset that brought such misery to the Indigenous people. I asked myself: Were there any white settler groups who could think outside of the government paradigm? With the guidance of the Meskwaki people, I learned of their positive relationship with the Amana Inspirationists, a Utopian society. These two communal groups, hidden away along the river in the middle of Iowa, while genocide swirled around them, were a model for the rest of the country.
My new play Squatters on Red Earth depicts that peaceful encounter between the Meskwakis and the Inspirationists in the midst of the white settler land grab. Here are a few excerpts from the play that is opening this week-end. For more information: maryswander.com.
June 9, 2023, 8:00 P.M. The Amana Performing Arts Center, Amana, IA.
June 10, 2023, 2:00 and 7:00 P.M. The Wieting Theatre, Toledo, IA.
Shelley Buffalo’s preliminary sketch for crankie set design illustration. Ronneburg Castle where the Amana Inspirationists sought refuge in Germany. Photo: Mary Swander
WHITE SETTLER MAN:
And so, we had contact with
the Meskwakis, and they us.
We were Germans with
whiskers growing on our cheeks.
Catfish, they called us.
Amana Colonists, we called ourselves,
from the Bible (Song of Solomon)
meaning remain faithful.
Faithfully, we white settlers kept up our song.
Plow, plow, plow.
We picked up the soil in our hands,
rubbing it between our fingers,
like nothing we’d ever seen.
And while we bent over,
cultivating weeds, breaking our backs,
the Meskwakis let their large squash leaves
do the work, filling in the gaps,
mulching between the rows.
Live on a few acres,
the white settlers told the Natives.
We will mind the rest.
Plow and be more productive, the settlers said.
Plow, plow, plow.
Grow corn and pigs.
Sell, sell, sell.
We will build stockyards in Chicago,
Hog butcher for the world.
Root or die,
the white settlers said.
Root or die.
*
What is this thing you call private property?
Massasoit asked those early settlers of Plymouth Colony.
It cannot be the earth, for the land is our mother,
nourishing all her children,
beasts, birds, fish and all men.
The woods, the streams, everything on it
belongs to everybody and is for the use of all.
How can one man say it belongs only to him?”
*
And here the Indigenous women farmed,
not the men. That was all wrong.
After the colonists had attacked their village,
the Pequots approached the settlers.
At first, they sent one of their powerful leaders—
a woman decorated in white seashells.
--I beg you for peace and mercy.
--Why are you here? Go home where you belong.
The second time, the Pequots
sent another woman who held similar powers.
--We offer peace and no more killing.
--You lie.
The third time, the Pequot sent
five women and an old man.
--We come in peace.
--And peace we’ll give you.
The colonists thought equal treatment of women
was against the Bible,
the very natural order.
Look what happened to Adam and Eve.
They looked at the Natives,
and saw Eve.
Credit: Molly Erickson, Alpha Graphics
Tickets to this week-end’s Squatters on Red Earth performances are free and open to the public. To reserve a free ticket email: agartsoffice@gmail.com.
Listen to Charity Nebbe’s Iowa Public Radio “Talk of Iowa” interview with Mary Swander, playwright and producer, and Shelley Buffalo, consultant and set designer, about “Squatters on Red Earth.”
So excited to hear of this history, and that it's being made into a public presentation. Fabulous!
I am so excited to be at the premiere of the play tomorrow.