In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

648 Trudie Lamb Richmond (b. 1931) Trudie Lamb Richmond has an ma in education from the Bank Street School of Education, and a ma in anthropology from the University of Connecticut. She retired in 2010 as director of public programs at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum after fifteen years. She was awarded the First People’s Fund Community Spirit award for her lifetime work as an educator and storyteller. She has served for over twenty years on the Native American Heritage Committee. She has served on both the Schaghticoke Tribal Council and the Indian Affairs Council. She presented her paper on Eunice Mauwee in May 2011 at the University of Massachusetts–Amherst, where she was serving as the tribal historian in residence. The second essay below appeared in Cross Paths, a publication of the Mashantucket Pequot Museum. Why Does the Past Matter? Eunice Mauwee’s Resistance Was Our Path to Survival Good afternoon. I am very pleased to be here and especially pleased to have the opportunity to introduce Eunice Mauwee, an important sociocultural figure in Schaghticoke history. She lived to be 104 years old. Her life straddled two centuries. Born in 1756, she died in 1860. For all of us born after 1860, she became the grandmother to us all. It was Eunice’s legacy of resistance that became our path to survival. This year’s conference title, “Why Does the Past Matter?” is truly a multilayered question, determined by who is reporting the past. Therefore, I would like to begin with these thoughts regarding indigenous grandmothers to set the tone for my remarks and the conference theme: When we were young, it was our grandmother who gathered us around to tell us of many things; of how the world began, of where we came from; why we must respect all living things; of the wonders of the universe. She always told us of the old ways. And when we were told these things, these truths, we searched her face of many wrinkles and believed she must have been there, way back then, in the beginning, so vivid were her words and the pictures she created in our mind’s eye. It Trudie Lamb Richmond 649 was only when we were much older that we realized that this was the way of the elders. Their words were the traditions being passed down from their grandmothers and grandfathers. The hypnotic quality of grandmother’s carefully selected words healed us. Cured us, strengthened and enriched our lives—which we were committed to pass on. trudie ray lamb (Logan, “Preface”) In researching the historical past of the Native people who have lived along the Housatonic River for many centuries, one quickly discovers that local historians’ writings were filled with inaccuracies. Most did not recognize the importance of how these communities in the Housatonic River Valley were all related, which created a strong kinship from Schaghticoke all the way down to Long Island Sound. These communities all had a strong partnership with the land and their cycle of subsistence was regulated by generations of spiritual tradition. However, these traditions and values were threatened repeatedly in the eighteenth century by the imposition of colonialism and the pressures of Christianity. The encroachment of colonists from New England to the east and New York to the west contributed to the weakening of Native social and political systems in the region. Native women and men were faced with difficult choices for survival: accommodate or boldly resist. However, to understand Eunice better one needs to understand the changing times in which she grew up and the survival choices that her father and grandfather had to make. Eunice was the daughter of Joseph “Chuse” Mauwee and the granddaughter of Gideon Mauwee, the last traditional sachem of the Schaghticoke people. Leadership is generally hereditary and a leader’s powers are absolute. But the actual use of power depends upon one’s ability as a diplomat. Mauwee was greatly respected and a man of many skills. He was a canoe maker as well as skilled at building sweat lodges. For a long time, it was Mauwee’s vision and leadership abilities that enabled his people to survive. He welcomed other Native people as they fled upriver from the colonial settlers who were obtaining more and more land. The nearby town of Kent was incorporated in 1736. Gideon, always looking out for the welfare of his people, approached the town officials and requested a school and teachers for the education of Schaghticoke children...

Share