Below is the speech that was given by Jackie Bowen at ‘Remember the Removal-2007‘
Our Creator is smiling upon us today and we have been blessed with sunshine to warm our saddened and wounded hearts. It is the will of our Creator that we should gather today to remember the life-changing removal of the Allegany Seneca from our ancestral lands. Thus, we are gathered in unity to remember, to reflect, and to mourn.
We shall always remember the loss of our lands that were the nucleus of our existence.
We shall always remember the loss of a Seneca way of life that was permanently destroyed. Some of us here today can tell you from experience, that we shall always remember the old land, the old people, the old ways, the old names, the old times, as it was before the REMOVAL. We shall always remember our grandfathers and our grandmothers who were the caretakers of our Seneca land and those who walked on because the loss of our land and our homes were more than they could bear.
The Allegany Reservation was an agricultural society until we lost our prime farming land in 1964.
The Grandfathers and Grandmothers in our past taught us how to respect and communicate with our land for our survival; teachings that ceased to exist after the REMOVAL. We were taught that our land gives us life. On these condemned lands that we see around us. We were taught when and where to dig the best wild onions and leeks and sassafras. We were taught where to find the best huckleberries, blackberries, raspberries, strawberries, and wild apples in the woods and fields. We were taught when to pick the milkweed, clean it, and cook it properly. We were taught to bundle the violets, bluebells, trailing arbutus, bittersweet, and June Pinks.
The Allegany Seneca once had thousands of acres from which to pick medicinal herbs and plants. We were taught when to plant, what to plant, and how to plant it. Seneca families raised their own chickens, pigs, cows. We were taught how, when, and where to hunt and fish and trap. We were taught how to preserve our food supply for the winter months. We were taught to share what we had with our neighbors.
Red House was my home. We crossed this old bridge more than once every day.
I will always see Red House as it once existed. I look to the east and I see the “Costello Grocery Store,” the Post Office, “Skinny’s Gas Station,” the Red House Indian School, the playground, the cemetery behind the school, the Red House Baptist Church, the old railroad station, our ball field, the old swimming hole, the skating pond, every house, and the beautiful faces of the Seneca families that give life to our Red House community…I can hear their voices and see their smiles.
There was a community spirit and bond in our old communities that could not be rekindled after the REMOVAL. As a child and teenager, I never imagined that my home and my entire community would literally be wiped off the map.
If you are a survivor of the REMOVAL, your spirit is tied to these old places. Everyday, your memories involuntarily return to the old places, the old times, the old faces, the old names, the old ways. When a survivor of the REMOVAL travels these condemned lands, we don’t see just empty fields, woods, and abandonment; we see each house, each driveway, the faces and the names of each family member who lived there, the old churches, the ballfield behind the old Longhouse, every road as it used to be – from the Salamanca City Line to the Wolf Run Road in Quaker Bridge to Onoville and the Cornplanter Grant.
We never stop thinking “I can’t believe it’s all gone.”
The Survivors of the REMOVAL harbor more than just memories because the memories perpetuate emotions and we feel sorrow and grief for what we have lost. Today, we are gathered on this old Red House Bridge with the spirits of our Seneca ancestors and their spirits will walk with us as we REMEMBER THE REMOVAL.
Please express your appreciation and gratitude to the committee members of this REMEMBER THE REMOVAL for their caring and voluntary labor and efforts to preserve and present the life of the Allegany Seneca before the REMOVAL.
We appreciate the participation of everybody here today. Thank you for caring and promoting the purpose of this REMEMBER THE REMOVAL. Plan to attend the numerous events scheduled at the Steamburg Community Building throughout today.
Nya:wëh
Jacqueline “Jackie” Bowen, Clerk
SENECA NATION OF INDIANS
