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378 Zara Ciscoe Brough (1919–1988) Also known as Princess White Flower, Zara Ciscoe Brough was descended from James Printer; her grandfather James Lemuel Cisco and her mother, Sara Cisco Sullivan, both led the Hassanamesit Nipmuc Reservation before Brough herself assumed that responsibility in 1959. She founded the tribal museum in 1962. Brough was a powerful businesswoman and civic leader. She studied engineering in college and was vice president of a technical consulting firm in Waltham, Massachusetts. Like many tribal leaders across New England, Brough also served in local organizations and town committees, including the Grafton Planning Board, to try to preserve and protect indigenous lands and resources. She helped establish the Massachusetts Commission of Indian Affairs and was the first Nipmuc Indian commissioner, from 1974 to 1984. The piece below appeared in the Nipmuc Nation Newsletter in July 2004. Days of Hassanamesit My grandfather Chief James Lemuel Cisco was born on the Indian Reservation on Brigham Hill Road in Grafton on June 30, 1846. He was the son of Samuel C. Cisco and Sarah Maria Arnold Cisco. He died on November 15, 1931 (my twelfth birthday). I dedicate this work on our family to him. What a person he was: quiet but authoritative—a true Chief, or Sachem, of the tribe. He was the eldest of eight children. Today we have in the museum schoolbooks used by these children of long ago. Is it a fine idea to present history by a vignette of one particular person when so many dominant people were involved? Maybe not. However, sometimes we must emphasize certain people, and in the case of James Lemuel Cisco, I emphasize a person who added so very much to current history and interests. James Lemuel Cisco was born on the old homestead of the Arnold Cisco family. His father, Samuel C. Cisco, who came from Cumberland / Slatersville area of Rhode Island, was a Narragansett Indian chief but, as was the custom of the day, was listed in various documents as a “foreigner.” Zara Ciscoe Brough 379 Samuel Cisco, my great grandfather, was a medicine man and herbalist. His wife was well known as a medicine woman, especially as a midwife. Great Grandpa was six feet tall, wore a straw pipe hat and hair down his back. Great Grandfather brought the Cisco branch of the family into existence in Grafton. He was a Narragansett chieftain. In the Massachusetts Indian census of 1860, he is listed as a “foreigner.” This means that he came from “outside” or a distant (in those days) place. The same document used the term “colored” to describe him. This didn’t mean a black person or Negro but meant a person other than white. Today, however, it’s difficult for many Indians to verify their heritage because this term was used as a “catch all.” Sometimes deliberately, sometimes when the tribal connection was not known. But “colored” in old records just means “not white European.” It’s said Samuel Cisco walked to Grafton in the 1840s, met Great Grandmother , Sarah Maria Arnold, and married her. In 1853, a letter was written by my great grandmother, Sarah Maria Arnold Cisco, stating that she wasn’t able to keep a cow and horse for her family. The cow was needed for the milk produced. The family’s land was being taken from her little by little. Her letter was a request to help her to retain what little she had. She was being “crowded” just as it is felt presently: a squeezed in feeling. She had nine children, so certainly needed space. There are many other letters of her era and later that tell of the turmoil in everyday life of their family. Great Grandfather Samuel Cisco was a medicine man and Great Grandmother was a medicine woman. One of the stories my mother would tell is of Samuel Cisco going to catch a black snake for rheumatism belts and bands he would make. He was over six feet they say, about six-foot four. He would go out with a long staff over his shoulder, in part to aid his walking and in part to help in obtaining the snakes he needed. Our men really didn’t smoke, but tobacco was kept for other purposes, such as for helping to catch black snakes. In Grafton, there was a part of town that was very wild: a large glacial area on what is now called Potter’s Hill. Here he’d hide himself as snakes would...

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