The School Papers: Native American Stereotypes

In this assignment, we were asked to write about our earliest memories of Native American culture.

My early childhood introduction to Native American culture was a weird blend of stereotype and reality.  My Grandmother, a first generation Swedish woman who had grown up in Chicago and relocated to the small Wyoming town of Lander in the early 1980’s took care of the stereotype aspect nicely.  Lander bordered the reservation where members of the Shoshone tribe lived. A fair amount of the native craft work made its way to the local craft bazaars and subsequently, in to my Grandmother’s living room, bed room, spare room, basement and craft room.  She recreated oil paintings of majestic big horn sheep gazing off into the distance, eagles, wolves and the like.   All of the animals the Native Americans stereotypically  revered  seemed to make their way into my Grandparents’ home. For instance, one could never forget the charming antler chandelier my Grandparents had fashioned and appointed to the entry of their classic late 70’s split level home.   My Grandmother acquired lamps made of skulls, weird skins of formerly furry things, not to mention the ubiquitous moccasins and beaded earrings.  The moccasins and beaded earrings were constant gifts, so much so that when my eldest daughter was born, one of the first things Grandma did was ship off a tiny pair of baby moccasins for my newborn.  This contributed to Lily's "native American name": Lily Whiteass Firehair.

The reality came from members of our church congregation in the form of the Thunder sisters.  I was fascinated by them

 simply because their last name was Thunder.  This was infinitely cooler in my 4 year old mind than my last name of

 “Steele” which I’d already determined was silly because it wasn’t our real last name; Smeele was.   When I asked them

 about their name, Debbie, the older of the two explained it was because they were Indian.  They had the prettiest black

 hair and were ridiculously nice to me, and the idea that they were Indian meant little because they seemed to be “just like

 me”.  The “just like me” piece changed when we drove them home one night.  Lander isn’t the most beautiful town, largely

 red rocks as memory serves, but I do remember the landscape becoming uglier the farther north one drove outside of

town, which is where the Thunder sisters lived.  After we dropped them off, I asked my Mom why they lived out here when it

was ugly.  “Because they’re Indians.  And Indians live on reservations.”   “But why?” I asked.  “Because,” was her answer. 

That was all she had for me at age 4.