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· 191 · Appendix 1 Pokagon’sAddressattheWorld’sColumbian Exposition,Chicago,1893 On the day following his arrival, a large number of ladies were holding a convention in the parlors of the Palmer House, considering the propriety of giving educated Indians of the race an opportunity to attend the Fair and hold a congress of their own. They sent a private carriage to the Fair grounds and brought the old chief before them.After explaining to him the object of the meeting, they requested that he would express his feelings in regard to the subject under consideration. He arose amid all the show of dress and the glitter of diamonds, apparently with as much composure as if he was among his own people in his own council-house, and said:— I rejoice that you are making an effort, at last, to have the educated people of my race take part in the great celebration. That will be much better for the good of our people, in the hearts of the dominant race, than war-whoops and battle-dances, such as I to-day witnessed on Midway Plaisance. It will increase our friends and encourage us. To-morrow will make the sixtieth year that has passed since my · 192 · Appendix 1 father sold for his tribe over one million acres of land, including the site of this city and the grounds on which the Exposition now stands, for three cents an acre. I have grown old trying to get the pay for my people. I have just returned from the city of the Great Father, where I have been allowed by the Court of Claims one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, which I expect will soon be paid.We wish to rejoice with you, and will accept your invitation with gratitude.The world’s people, from what they have so far seen of us on the Midway, will regard us as savages; but they shall yet know that we are human as well as they, and the children of my father will always love those who help us to show that we are men. Perhaps no one person contributed more to swell the vast audience at the Fair on Chicago day than did Pokagon. For two weeks previous, his coming was announced in glowing head-lines by all the leading papers of the city and throughout the United States. He was the great master link between Shegogong1 as an Indian village and Chicago as one of the greatest commercial cities of the world. His father, for forty-two years the leading chief of the Pottawattamies, had owned the city site, including the Exposition grounds. His son Pokagon, the present chief, when a boy, had lived in Chicago; was there when it was transferred to the United States; and had camped many times with his father on the very grounds where stood the “White City.” His father, too, had there killed the buffalo and the deer, and over the same ground had many times led his warriors around the head of Lake Michigan. On the morning of Chicago day, the opening exercises of the Fair were heralded by sixteen trumpeters sent by General Miles from Fort Sheridan.They were richly attired, resplendent in royal purple and scarlet, decorated and trimmed with lace that glistened like burnished gold in the sunshine. Four of the trumpeters took their position on the Administration building, four on the Columbian arch peristyle, and the others on the Manufactures and Liberal Arts building flanking the lagoon. They first played a fanfare in quartet of “peace on earth and goodwill to men,” repeating it all in unison. This was followed by the discharge of cannon as a salute to all nations, which, like heavy thunder, rolled through the winding avenues of the White City, dying away in one continuous roar. The trumpeters then played an overture to all the kingdoms of the earth, followed by the Address at the World’s Columbian Exposition· 193 · “Star-Spangled Banner,” with a chorus of two thousand voices, while the vast multitude joined the refrain. At the west plaza of the Administration building stood the new Liberty Bell awaiting dedication, and rung for the first time on that day by Chief Pokagon. Pushing their way inch by inch through the dense crowd at nine o’clock a.m. appeared Mayor Harrison and the old chief, and others of his tribe, with Miss Sickels, chairman of the Historical Committee, and several maidens of the Cherokee nation, taking...

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