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Akwesasne Notes: How the Mohawk Nation Created a Newspaper and Shaped Contemporary Native America DOUG GEORGE-KANENTIIO T o understand how Akwesasne Notes, the most influential aboriginal newspaper of the twentieth century, came to be, one must understand the history of the Mohawk community of Akwesasne, where it was born in 1968. History among the Mohawks is a highly personal matter since it involves the life stories of a people with, like all Native peoples, a deep spiritual connection with the land in which the story takes root. When a Mohawk person speaks of his community, it becomes a narrative in which he carries the experiences of his ancestors across the generations. Akwesasne is a community rich in story, tragic, comedic, and dramatic. By intertwining the oral and written records, a compelling epic emerges, one that is about not only mere survival but also perseverance through decades of adversity. Since the Akwesasne region is particularly fertile in the way of natural resources, it follows that its history would be equally prolific. Located at the confluence of the Grasse, Racquette, St. Regis, Salmon, and St. Lawrence rivers, one hundred kilometers southwest of Montreal, Akwesasne carries along a tremendous water flow from the Adirondack Mountains that is filtered by the largest freshwater marshes in the northeast. Birds of all kinds, from sharp-eyed eagles to the broad-winged great blue heron, have found excellent fishing in the crystal waters along the edges of the marsh, which also contain the lodges of hundreds of muskrats and beavers. There are over thirty islands at Akwesasne, ranging in size from the half-acre Hen Island to the flat tilling fields of St. Regis and Yellow islands. The St. Lawrence is squeezed through narrow channels on either side of five-mile-long Cornwall Island. The remnants of the powerful Long Sault rapids remain in the northern channel, while the southern section gently flows against the clay shores of the U.S. mainland. Akwesasne is the only Native reservation in North America bisected by the international border between Canada and the United States along the 45th degree of latitude. Its 12,000 residents are primarily Mohawk, but, as is typical among most Native communities, there are other aboriginal people on the 11,300-hectare territory, such as Lakotas, Anishnabes, and Choctaws alongside the other Iroquois: Oneidas, Cayugas, Onondagas, Senecas, and Tuscaroras. Given the liberal and open immigration and formal adoption customs of the 110 | Doug George-Kanentiio Mohawks, other Natives have no problem moving to Akwesasne; in fact, intermarriage with other indigenous peoples is highly encouraged. Mohawk is, however, the primary culture and definitive language. The region itself has long been called home by the Mohawks, whose history in the area stretches back at least two thousand years. But the Mohawks were not the first people to call the area their home. Those who came before the Mohawks were of the Algonquin family: hunters, fishermen, trappers. They were attracted to the region primarily because of its biological diversity and physical beauty. In former times, the islands were a resting ground for herds of caribou and deer as they swam across the river during the autumn migrations. There were also rumbling bears, bellowing elks, howling wolves, and yowling cougars, all of which disappeared when the area was colonized in the early nineteenth century. An abundance of physical evidence clearly shows that the Akwesasne region has long been Iroquois territory. From pottery shards to burial mounds, there is every indication that a series of thriving communities flourished along the river. The elaborate rituals that defined Mohawk life could only have been sustained by a people who had the time and food resources to participate in ceremonies that lasted as long as a week. The complex social life of the Mohawks was quite different from that of their Algonquin neighbors, since the Iroquois were an agriculturally based culture, with corn as the primary staple. According to oral tradition, a large Mohawk village on the peninsula juts into the place where the St. Lawrence and St. Regis rivers meet. A Catholic church currently on the site is strategically placed to command a view of the main water route to and from the continental interior, at least from the northeast. It would have been logical to expect the Mohawks to have made use of the location by having a palisaded village there, as it would have enabled them to monitor river traffic and exercise control over...

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