The Ghost Dance Eclipse

January 1, 1889 a man stands in the darkness, experiencing the solar eclipse in the night sky has a vision from God. A message from the heavens to be shared by all.

The man stood before God in heaven and saw many of his ancestors engaged in their favorite pastimes. God showed the man a beautiful land filled with wild game and instructed him to return home to tell his people that they must love each other, not fight, and live in peace with the whites. 

God also stated that the people must work, not steal or lie, and that they must not engage in the old practices of war or the traditional self-mutilation practices connected with mourning the dead. God said that if his people abide by these rules, they would be united with their friends and family in the other world. Where in God's presence, there would be no sickness, disease, or old age.

Jack Wilson

This beautiful vision was described by a man named Jack Wilson aka Wovoka. The son of a ‘weather doctor’, Wilson was known as a gifted and naturally talented leader amongst the Paiutes living is Mason Valley (now currently known as Nevada). However, Wilson was not the first to have this powerful vision. Hawthorne Wodziwob, a Paiute man, organized a series of community dances to announce his vision. He spoke of a journey to the land of the dead and of promises made to him by the souls of the recently deceased. They promised to return to their loved ones within a period of three to four years. Wodziwob’s vision was coming off of a devastating typhoid epidemic, killing approximately one-tenth of the Paiute populace. 

Amongst the widespread psychological and emotional trauma, Wodziwob’s words of healing were embraced. He, along with a ‘weather doctor’ named Tavibo urged the use of a common circle dance in celebration of life. Referred to as the "round dance", this ritual form, characteristically includes a circular community dance held around an individual who leads the ceremony. It was used in many community rituals. Often accompanying the ritual are intermissions of trance, exhortations and prophesying.

Coming full circle, years later Jack Wilson was given the Ghost Dance in his vision and commanded to take it back to his people.He preached that if the five-day dance was performed in the proper intervals, the performers would secure their happiness and hasten the reunion of the living and deceased. Wilson said that God gave him powers over the weather and that he would be the deputy in charge of affairs in the western United States, leaving current President Harrison as God's deputy in the East. Jack claims that he was then told to return home and preach God's message.

Jack Wilson claimed to have left the presence of God convinced that if every Indian in the West danced the new dance to "hasten the event", all evil in the world would be swept away, leaving a renewed Earth filled with food, love, and faith.

Such a promising vision created hard times for the Native America nation as a whole. It’s

Chief Kicking Bear

rampant spread throughout the countries Native American population made the European settlers suspicious. To the point of causing the loss of many lives. 

In February 1890, the United States government broke a Lakota treaty by adjusting the Great Sioux Reservation of South Dakota. Breaking it up into five smaller reservations, the Native American’s were expected to adopt the European-American culture of farming the land. 

Unfortunately South Dakota was in the throws of an intense heat wave, and coupled with minimal rainfall made the land barren and unable to produce any substantial yields. Bison had become virtually extinct in the area and the Sioux quickly reached the brink of starvation. 

In the wake of desperation the Sioux looked to their God for assistance, taking up the ritual of the Ghost dance. The dance, however, alarmed the European-American agents sent to supervise the transition. Even with the extraction of Chief Kicking Bear, the dance continued. 

The European-American agents requested additional troops, claiming Sitting Bull was the real leader of the movement. Despite several protests, thousands of US Army troops were deployed to the reservations. 

On December 15th 1890 Sitting Bull was killed in a misunderstanding when one of Sitting Bull's men, Catch the Bear, fired at Lieutenant "Bull Head," striking his right side. He instantly wheeled and shot Sitting Bull.

The Wounded Knee Massacre marked the end of the Ghost Dance when 153 Sioux men, women and children, and 25 US soldiers were needlessly killed because of a weapon’s discharge. Following the massacre,and the official surrender of Chief Kicking Bear, interest and participation in the Ghost Dance movement dropped dramatically for fear of continued violence against practitioners of the religion.

 In an interesting twist, as I was researching this article I realized the ‘weather doctor’ was also the father of Jack Wilson. Coincidence? Probably not, however I am not going to let this connection sway me (and I hope it will not for you) from the core peaceful message the Ghost Dance sought to reinforce. It is so sad to think if that message would have been somehow communicated to the European settlers the fate of the Native American Nation as a whole could have been much different. 

All we can do now is retell the story and hope we will learn from our ancestors mistakes.