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During WW2 Joe Medicine Crow, a native American, completed all four feats required to be a war chief: touching an enemy without killing him, taking an enemy's weapon, leading a war party and stealing 50 horses from the SS, singing a Crow honour song as he rode away.

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The near-extinction of the American bison was a deliberate plan by the US Army to starve Native Americans into submission. One colonel told a hunter who felt guilty shooting 30 bulls in one trip, "Kill every buffalo you can! Every buffalo dead is an Indian gone.”

What aspect of native american history became known as the trail of tears?

In my opinion, it is useful to put together a list of the most interesting details from trusted sources that I've come across answering what is the history of native american. Here are 50 of the best facts about Native Americans I managed to collect.

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  1. Honey bees aren't native to North America. When they arrived from Europe they spread out faster than the colonists, and Native Americans considered the appearance of the "white man's fly" to indicate the approach of European settlers

  2. The US Army never gave the Native Americans smallpox infested blankets as a tool of genocide. The US did inflict countless atrocities against the natives, but the smallpox blankets story was fabricated by a University of Colorado professor.

  3. In 2013, Star Wars was dubbed in Navajo, making it the first major film to be dubbed in a Native American language

  4. A professinal linguist in Native American languages was asked to invent Klingon for Star Trek. He speaks Klingon, but notes that others have attained greater fluency

  5. Andrew Myrick, a storekeeper on a Minnesota Native American reservation, told starving natives to get grass if they were hungry. He was found dead on the first day of the Dakota War of 1862 with grass stuffed in his mouth.

  6. There is a Star Wars comic called Into the Great Unknown in which Han Solo and Chewbacca crash into Earth after using Hyperspace blindly. Native Americans kill Han, and his body is discovered by Indiana Jones 126 years later while searching for Sasquatch—which turns out to be Chewbacca.

  7. Maize, beans and squash, the three main agricultural crops of Native Americans were named Three Sisters by them for their symbiotic relationship when grown together. Maize gives structure for the beans to climb, beans provides nitrogen to the soil and squash spread-grows preventing weed growth.

  8. The legendary Johnny Cash fought for the rights of Native Americans and dedicated an entire album to them. Radio stations refused to play any of the album. In retaliation, Cash bought an ad on Billboard asking: "Where are your guts?"

  9. Marlon Brando was the last person to reject a winning Oscar award (1973 best actor for The Godfather). He did it to protest the film industry's poor treatment of Native Americans. When a young Native American woman gave her speech in Brando's place, part of the crowd booed.

  10. In 1973 when Marlon Brando won an Oscar for Best Actor, he boycotted the show and sent a Native American woman named Sacheen Littlefeather instead. She refused the Oscar on his behalf and made a speech about Hollywood’s mistreatment of Native Americans. She was booed.

native americans facts
What has happened to native american languages through history?

Native Americans data charts

For your convenience take a look at Native Americans figures with stats and charts presented as graphic.

native americans fact data chart about Visualization of Elizabeth Warren's Native American ancestor
Visualization of Elizabeth Warren's Native American ancestor.

Why is native american history not taught in schools?

You can easily fact check why is the native american perspective left out of american history by examining the linked well-known sources.

Native Americans created a universal sign language that allowed 2/3 of all Indigenous tribes to communicate across most of North America, hundreds of years before Europeans invented a sign language of their own.

Adolf Hitler praised the Native American genocide by the US government. In 1928 he said; "gunned down the millions of Redskins to a few hundred thousand, and now keep the modest remnant under observation in a cage." - source

The US federal government has an office that receives dead eagles, which are then used by Native Americans for religious purposes. - source

Life in Puritan New England was so hard that children who were abducted by Native Americans often refused to come back

It is illegal to collect or possess eagle feathers in the United States, and only enrolled members of a federally recognized Native American tribe may legally possess them. - source

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Grizzly bears were so feared and respected by Native Americans that hunting them required a company of 4 to 10 warriors and was done with the same preparation and ceremoniality as intertribal warfare.

About the “7th generation” principle which was taught by Native Americans saying that in every decision, be it personal, governmental or corporate, we must consider how it will affect our descendents seven generations into the future.

Native Americans were in contact with the Donner party several times, and actively offered them food. Only to be "Scared off/denied" and the Donner party to unfortunately choose cannibalism.

Samoset, the first Native American to make contact with the Pilgrims of Plymouth Colony. He entered the settlement unannounced, greeted the colonists in English (which he had learned from fishermen in Maine), and asked for beer.

The Native American "Shame Pole", a totem pole erected to embarrass people for not payment of debts or ridicule misdeeds. In 2007 one such pole was erected in Alaska depicting the CEO of Exxon to highlight an unpaid debt of $5m owed from the Exxon Valdez oil spill.

Lacrosse, as originally played by Native Americans, fielded teams from 100 to 1,000 men, with goals 500 yards to 6 miles apart, with games lasting several days, played sunup to sundown. These games tended to become huge mobs of players swarming the ball and slowly moving it across the field.

Interesting facts about native americans

In 1959, Martin Luther King Jr. made an impromptu stop at the Tohono O'odham Indian Reservation to meet with tribal leaders whom he was "fascinated" by. This visit would later lead Dr. King to speak out against the government's treatment, both past & present, of Native Americans.

Hard Rock Cafe is entirely owned by the native american Seminole Tribe of Florida

Star Wars was released in the Navajo Language, the first motion picture to be translated into a Native American language

Life in Puritan New England was so hard that children who were abducted by Native Americans often refused to come back

Native Americans in the 1964 movie 'Cheyenne Autumn', (because no one on the set spoke their language) would say crude remarks that made it into the movie. In the scene where the treaty is signed, you can hear (but not understand) them mocking the size of the colonel's penis

The Shakopee Mdewakanton Tribe is the richest Native American Tribe, with each member being paid $1 million per year from casino profits. And there is a voluntary 99.2 percent unemployment rate within the tribe.

The Jay Treaty, signed in 1794, provides that American Indians may travel freely across the Canadian-US border. Native Indians born in Canada are entitled to freely enter the United States for the purpose of employment, study, retirement, investing, and/or immigration.

About Dewey Beard, the last Native American veteran of the 1876 Battle of Little Bighorn. In 1892, his family was killed by the US Army at the Wounded Knee Massacre, and he was shot. In 1942, the Department of War confiscated his land to form a firing range. He died in poverty in 1955.

Joseph Medicine Crow, a Native American of the Crow tribe, served in World War II and completed all the requirements to become a war chief while at war, making him the last Crow member to do so.

After oil was discovered on their homelands, 60 or more wealthy, full-blood Osage native Americans were killed from 1918 to 1931. The murders appear to have been committed by people intent on taking over their great wealth, whose land was producing valuable oil, and had annual royalties.

About the American town 'Merrymount', founded 1624. Named from slang at the time for 'illicit' forms of sex - the town rejected Puritan values welcoming non-Heterosexuals, freeing indentured servants and intermarrying Native Americans. Five years later it was invaded and razed to the ground.

British longbows in the 1600's netted much longer firing ranges than the contemporary Native American Powhaten tribe's bows (400 yds vs. 120 yds, respectively). Colonists from Jamestown once turned away additional longbows for fear that they might fall into the Powhaten's hands.

Zoos save feathers that come off many of their birds and have them distributed to Native American tribes for their religious ceremonies.

Native American Mohawks were often used as labourers on the skyscrapers because it was believed they had no natural fear of heights. In fact, they were afraid, but unlike their American workers, their culture meant they never showed it.

York, William Clark's slave, was one of the first Africans that the Native Americans West of the Mississippi River met. They tried to wash the blackness off of him, and when they discovered that he was in fact human they respected his strength.

A genetic study of people from Iceland found a number of them had a mutation predominantly found among Native Americans. It has theorised that this could be because of American women breeding with Viking men, during Norse exploration of America in the 11th century AD.

Crime is a major problem in Pine Ridge Indian reservation and since many of the Native Americans grow up as master horsemen, the reservation has an actual problem with gangs of Indians on horseback terrorizing the towns and riding away into the sunset where police vehicles can't follow.

The Nazis considered Native Americans to be part of the Aryan race.

Seattle changed Columbus day to indigenous peoples day in 2014 to acknowledge that native Americans were living in the Americas long before Columbus "discovered" it.

This is our collection of basic interesting facts about Native Americans. The fact lists are intended for research in school, for college students or just to feed your brain with new realities. Possible use cases are in quizzes, differences, riddles, homework facts legend, cover facts, and many more. Whatever your case, learn the truth of the matter why is Native Americans so important!

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