Cherokee Legend : The Moon and the Thunders

The Sun was a young woman and lived in the East, while her brother, the Moon. lived in the West. The girl had a lover who used to come every month in the dark of the moon to court her. He would come at night, and leave before daylight.

Although she talked with him she could not see his face in the dark, and he would not tell her his name, until she was wondering all the time who it could be.

At last she hit upon a plan to find out, so the next time he came, as they were sitting

together in the dark of the âsi, she slyly dipped her hand into the cinders and ashes of the fireplace and rubbed it over his face, saying, "Your face is cold; you must have suffered from the wind," and pretending to be very sorry for him, but he did not know that she had ashes on her hand. After a while he left her and went away again.

The next night when the Moon came up in the sky his face was covered with spots, and then his sister knew he was the one who had been coming to see her. He was so much ashamed to have her know it that he kept as far away as he could at the other end of the sky all the night. Ever since he tries to keep a long way behind the Sun, and when he does sometimes have to come near her in the west he makes himself as thin as a ribbon so that he can hardly be seen.

Some old people say that the moon is a ball which was thrown up against the sky in a game a long time ago. They say that two towns were playing against each other, but one of them had the best runners and had almost won the game, when the leader of the other side picked up the ball with his hand--a thing that is not allowed in the game--and tried to throw it to the goal, but it struck against the solid sky vault and was fastened there, to remind players never to cheat. When the moon looks small and pale it is because some one has handled the ball unfairly, and for this reason they formerly played only at the time of a full moon.

When the sun or moon is eclipsed it is because a great frog up in the sky is trying to swallow it. Everybody knows this, even the Creeks and the other tribes, and in the olden times, eighty or a hundred years ago, before the great medicine men were all dead, whenever they saw the sun grow dark the people would come together and fire guns and beat the drum, and in a little while this would frighten off the great frog and the sun would be all right again.

The common people call both Sun and Moon Nûñdä, one being "Nûñdä that dwells in the day" and the other "Nûñdä that dwells in the night," but the priests call the Sun Su'tälidihï', "Six-killer," and the Moon Ge'`yägu'ga, though nobody knows now what this word means, or why they use these names. Sometimes people ask the Moon not to let it rain or snow.

The great Thunder and his sons, the two Thunder boys, live far in the west above the sky vault. The lightning and the rainbow are their beautiful dress. The priests pray to the Thunder and call him the Red Man, because that is the brightest color of his dress.

There are other Thunders that live lower down, in the cliffs and mountains, and under waterfalls, and travel on invisible bridges from one high peak to another where they have their town houses. The great Thunders above the sky are kind and helpful when we pray to them, but these others are always plotting mischief. One must not point at the rainbow, or one's finger will swell at the lower joint.

The Healing Power of Peyote

Warning, the below presented views may be offensive to some and are not necessarily the shared views of the readers and or authors of this website.

So, picture this, you are in a church and it is time to take communion. You wait patiently in line, hands folded, praying you will be worth of such a heavenly gift. It’s your turn, you step up to the priest, he is flanked by two altar boys. You look up into his eyes, he says “This is the body of Christ” and you reply ‘Amen.” He places a thin wafer upon your tongue, you close your mouth step to the side, make the sign of the cross and go back to your seat.  Once you arrive back in the wooden pew you take the serene moment to kneel before God, thanking him for his blessing and asking for his grace. 

Now take this entire scenario, but replace the wafer with a button of cactus or a sip of tea.  I can hear all of the gasps of horror and the shock of what I propose, however the two instances are remarkably similar despite their cultural gaps. To the Christian, the wafer is a gift from God, the body of Christ. According to the Christian Sacrament, ‘When Our Lord said, "This is My body," the entire substance of the bread was changed into His body; and when He said, "This is My blood," the entire substance of the wine was changed into His blood.

Peyote is also regarded as a gift from God. “To us it is a portion of the body of Christ, even as the communion bread is believed to be a portion of Christ's body by other Christian denominations. Christ spoke of a Comforter who was to come. It never came to Indians until it was sent by God in the form of this Holy Medicine." - Albert Hensley, a Winnebago.

Peyote is not eaten to induce visions, it heals and teaches righteousness. It is eaten, or consumed as a tea, according to a formal ritual and offers the opportunity for self-understanding through self-examination. This experience can lead an individual to new understandings about their situation in life and the repercussions of their actions. Road men (Road Man, or Road Chief, is a title given to the leader of the peyote ceremony in the Native American Church) encourage participants to ‘ask the medicine’ or ‘listen to what the medicine tells you’ about a certain problem. They point out how the ‘power of the peyote healing experience can set a person on another course – a life of dedication in a deeper sense’.

Does anyone else see the similarities? Both rituals are meant for self enlightenment and healing. Of course the wafer doesn’t really have the same side-effects. I am sorry as I do not want to offend anyone but can you imagine a congregation of people experiencing the effects of peyote on a Sunday morning? According to the research, the participants could be starting out their week right, as it has been noted that an ‘afterglow’ effect can many times be experienced for 7 to 10 days after ingestion, humming the song ‘Because I’m Happy'...

The peyote cactus contains buttons that can be cut from the root and dried. The buttons can be chewed or soaked in water to produce an digestible liquid. They can also be ground into a powder and smoked in conjunction with the leaves of cannabis or tobacco.

The effects of ingestion of peyote varies from user to user but among the most common are; vivid   heightened sensory experiences (i.e. brighter colors, sharper visual definition, increased hearing acuity, more distinguished taste), difficult focusing, maintaining attention, concentrating, and thinking, loss of sense of reality; melding past experiences with present, preoccupation with trivial thoughts, experiences, or objects,  highly adverse reactions ("bad trip"), including frightening hallucinations, confusion, disorientation, paranoia, agitation, depression, panic, and/or terror. – This last one would totally be my personal reaction to it!  Surprisingly, no physical dependence or psychological dependence has been reported, although it may be possible.

mental images and distorted vision, perception of seeing music or hearing colors, altered space and time perception, joy, exhilaration, panic, extreme anxiety, or terror, a distorted sense of body (users can feel either weighed down or weightless),

Because of the intense psychological effects of the consumption, the use of peyote in spiritual ceremonies has been present in many cultures for over 10,000 years. From the very beginning, ‘modern” society has misunderstood the Native American adoration of peyote. Fear and lack of knowledge has led to denouncing the spiritual journey as diabolic and satanic.

Serious study of its use, however, began 1890 when James Mooney, an anthropologist from the Smithsonian Institution, researched Peyote meetings among the Kiowa in Oklahoma. He extended his studies of Peyote rituals to other American reservations as well as its use by the Tarahumara in Mexico. In 1918, Mooney testified in favor of Native American at Congressional hearings in an effort to obtain a legal charter to protect their religious freedom and the use of peyote within those rights. The Native American Church or NAC was officially incorporated in 1918. Currently supporting eighty chapters and members belonging to some seventy Native American Nations. 

In the present day, peyote is very effective is in the treatment of alcoholism. Acceptance into the NAC requires abstinence from alcohol and drugs. The community is also seemingly close knit offering the consistent support a recovering addict will need in recovery. The peyote itself is empowering in its own right. The ceremonies help  the addict mentally have power over the alcohol. During ceremonies, the road man will ask the creator to help the person by speaking to them through the peyote, as it acts as a messenger between the individual and the creator. By absorbing the healing power behind the ritual, and the experience, hope in a transformation and new ways of living becomes much more attainable and sustainable.

Whether you are receiving holy communion or looking for spiritual enlightenment through a ritual of faith, in the end, we are all looking for answers to the greater questions. Thus we are all the same. Methodology of enlightenment should not matter, as the intent of enlightenment is the growth of one’s own soul.

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.

A Native American Legend, Sitting Bull

Also know as Tatanka Yotanka,which describes a buffalo bull sitting intractably on its haunches. A Lakota, born in what is now South Dakota, probably in 1831, son of a respected Sioux warrior named Returns-Again. The child wanted to follow in his father's footsteps but showed no particular talent for warfare, so he was given the name "Slow" until he could earn a better one. He earned Tatanka Yotanka (aka Sitting Bull) during a fight with rival Crow Indians.

Sitting Bull’s position on the white man was largely negative, having been quoted saying "The whites may get me at last... but I will have good times until then."

In 1874, gold was discovered in the Black Hills of the Dakota Territory, and while a treaty had been given to the Sioux for the land, the white settlers continued to come and clashes between the two became inevitable. When government efforts to purchase the Black Hills failed, the Fort Laramie Treaty was set aside and the commissioner of Indian Affairs decreed that all Lakota not settled on reservations by January 31, 1876, would be considered hostile. Sitting Bull and his people held their ground.

Sitting Bull summoned the Lakota, Cheyenne and Arapaho to his camp on Rosebud Creek in Montana Territory. There he led them in the sun dance ritual, offering prayers to Wakan Tanka, their Great Spirit, and slashing his arms one hundred times as a sign of sacrifice.

**Sitting Bull gave 100 pieces of flesh from his arms in a Sun Dance offering. He had a vision of soldiers falling into the Indian camp and heard a voice say, "I give you these because they have no ears."**

The Lakota moved their camp and were joined by 3,000 more Indians who had left the reservations to follow Sitting Bull. Here they were attacked on June 25 by the Seventh Cavalry under George Armstrong Custer, whose badly outnumbered troops first rushed the encampment, as if in fulfillment of Sitting Bull's vision, and then made a stand on a nearby ridge, where they were destroyed. The blood bath of Custer and his men, known as the battle of Little Big Horn, brought thousands more cavalrymen to the area.

Over the next year they relentlessly pursued the Lakota, forcing chief after chief to surrender. In May 1877 he led his band across the border into Canada, beyond the reach of the U.S. Army. Four years later, however, with buffalo almost extinct, and his people starving, Sitting Bull finally came south to surrender. On July 19, 1881, he had his young son hand his rifle to the commanding officer of Fort Buford in Montana, explaining that in this way he hoped to teach the boy "that he has become a friend of the Americans." Yet at the same time, Sitting Bull said, "I wish it to be remembered that I was the last man of my tribe to surrender my rifle."

Allowed to travel on occasion, Sitting Bull met Ms. Annie Oakley in 1884. So impressed by her

marksmanship he adopted her into the Lakota family naming her “Little Sure Shot”. Sitting Bull then joined Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West Show as an attraction in the opening procession. He enjoyed the work, compensated $50 a week in addition to all of the autographs he could sell.

**I am a red man. If the Great Spirit had desired me to be a white man he would have made me so in the first place.** 

The money he earned went to feeding orphan boys. He once made this comment to Annie Oakley regarding the way orphans were treated. "The white man knows how to make everything, but he does not know how to distribute it."

Returning to Standing Rock in 1889, Sitting Bull lived in a cabin on the Grand River. Refusing to give up his old ways, he did consent to his children being educated in a nearby Christian school. He held the belief the next generation of Lakota would need to be able to read and write.

In the fall of 1890, a Miniconjou Lakota named Kicking Bear came to Sitting Bull with news of the Ghost Dance. A ceremony promising to rid the land of white people and restore the Indians' way of life, the Lakota had already adopted the ceremony at the Pine Ridge and Rosebud Reservations. At Standing Rock, the authorities feared that Sitting Bull, still revered as a spiritual leader, would join the Ghost Dancers.

Before dawn on December 15, 1890, police burst into Sitting Bull's cabin and dragged him outside. His tribe gathered to protect him, but in the gunfight that followed, one of the Lakota policemen put a bullet through Sitting Bull's head.

**Legend says that when his gray horse heard the shots, he went into his Wild West Show routine, sitting on his haunches and pawing the air over Sitting Bull’s body. Many thought that the spirit of Sitting Bull entered his favorite gray horse.**

Buried at Fort Yates in North Dakota, and in 1953 his remains were moved to Mobridge, South Dakota, where a granite shaft marks his grave. He is remembered not only as an inspirational leader and fearless warrior but as a loving father, a gifted singer, a man always affable and friendly toward others, whose deep religious faith gave him prophetic insight and lent special power to his prayers.

Bella Starr the Bandit Queen

In 1898 publisher Richard K. Knox started an empire by selling outlandish stories of the lives of Western outlaws and circulated thousands of volumes of the amply titled dime novel. Amongst the infamous characters of Jesse James and Billy the Kid was also a female outlaw, Bella Starr, The Bandit Queen, or The Female Jesse James. Marketed as a dashing female highwayman, the novels included copious extracts from her ‘journal’. 

While also being handsomely illustrated. (Juicy plus pictures, not bad for a dime.) The books, ballads, poems and even motion pictures spawned from the extraordinary tales seem to be only part of the actual truth.

Bella Starr was the daughter of John and Elizabeth Shirley. Elizabeth held the maiden name of Hatfield, and was a member of the famous family feud. A child tomboy Myra May ‘Bella’ Shirley was raised to be a genteel lady, studying Greek, Hebrew, and Latin, she could also daintily play the piano. A lover of books, her favorite author was William Gilmore Simms, whose dramatic depictions of the South often featured dramatic strong heroines. Also an accomplished rider, she was often seen riding side saddle wearing a tight black riding jacket. 

Now comes the interesting twist in the story. Myra aka Bella was also known for riding through the country side at break-neck speeds on her favorite horse, Venus. High atop the gorgeous mare, Bella was often sporting an ostrich plumed man's Stetson hat. If you were able to get close enough, you might catch a peak at the rawhide necklace of rattlesnake rattles dangling from her neck.

Those who didn’t take her seriously or give her the respect she deserved were threatened with the barrel of her six-shooter.

A teenager during the civil war, Bella volunteered to spy on the troops through her social circles and report back to the southern guerrillas. After the war, she moved her parents to Texas where she assisted in hiding the outlaw Cole Younger, who arrived with the James-Younger Gang, which included Jesse and Frank James, as well as Bob and John Younger. The gang was looking for a place to hide out following a recent robbery, and Bella, knowing the men were former confederate soldiers, agreed to help them. 

While it is said Cole Younger and Bella had a torrid affair, it was never confirmed by wither party but Bella seemed to have kept him in her heart, eventually giving her ranch in Indian Territory the name Younger’s Flats.

Bella later fell in love and married a man named Jim Reed, with whom she had a daughter and a son. Bella being the dutiful wife followed Reed all over the country as he ran from the law and gambling debts. Arriving in Missouri, Reed was restless and rarely at home, racing horses and gambling in Indian Territory, particularly with Tom Starr's clan. Starr was the leader of a Cherokee family involved in whiskey smuggling and cattle rustling, and a formidable and towering man with long black hair and gray eyes with the lashes plucked. He's said to have worn a necklace studded with the dried earlobes of men he had killed.

While Bella was said to support all of Reed’s misdeeds, there was one thing she would not stand and that was another woman. Reed became involved with a lady named Rosa McCommas, and Bella broke off their marriage. Reed continued robbing stagecoaches, stealing horses and cattle, and gambling, until he was shot and killed in Paris, Texas in August of 1874.

After leaving Reed, Bella spent much of her time in Dallas, a boomtown in the 1870s as a railroad center and portal for cattle herds, and even without Reed she still got into some trouble, being accused of horse stealing in 1878. After too many complaints were filed against her she was told by Collin County to leave the state. 

In a tribal ceremony in 1880, Bella married Sam Starr son of Tom Starr. The couple claimed a thousand acres of land west of Fort Smith, Arkansas. With their friends always getting into some sort of trouble with robbery or gunfights, Bella's home again became a hideout for such guests as Jesse James. She said in an interview with the Dallas Morning News that she was "a friend to any brave and gallant outlaw."

Things after that were far from quiet, and one day Sam went riding on Venus, and was confronted by a four man posse led by Sam’s old enemy Frank West. Venus was shot and killed, and a bullet grazed Sam’s head. Later that year, just before Christmas, Bella and Sam were at a dance at a neighbor’s house when Sam was told that Frank West was outside. He went out to meet him, and in their duel both men drew their guns at once and simultaneously killed each other.

Bella’s adventures continued with several more run-ins with the law, including Edgar A Watson, who is also suspected in Bella’s death. Myra “Bella” Shirley Reed Starr returned to Younger’s Bend on February 3, 1889, the story has been told that she was thrown from her horse by a shotgun blast to the back. "The Petticoat Terror of the Plains" was shot again while on the ground, with wounds discovered on her back, neck, shoulder, and face. Her horse galloped home riderless, and Bella was found bloody and dead on the wintry road.

Edgar M. Watson was never charged with the murder and the case has been left unsolved. 

Bella Starr was buried near Eufair Lake, southeast of Porum, Oklahoma, at Younger’s Bend. On her tombstone, commissioned by her daughter Pearl with her bordello earnings, was engraved a bell, a horse, and a star, along this epitaph: 

"Shed not for her the bitter tear,

Nor give the heart to vain regret;

'Tis but the casket that lies here,

The gem that filled it sparkles yet."

Oklahoma! - A Tangle of Love Triangles in the Old West

Oklahoma! One of my personal favorites, is a 1955 musical film based on the 1943 stage musical Oklahoma!, The first musical written by infamous collaboration team of composer Richard Rodgers and lyricist/librettist Oscar Hammerstein II. The film debuted Shirley Jones as Laurey and Gordon MacRae as Curly, Rod Steiger, as Jud best know for his Oscar winning portrayal of Gillespie, in 1968’s In the Heat of the Night. Also starring Charlotte Greenwood, Gloria Grahame, Gene Nelson, James Whitmore and Eddie Albert.

The musical is a tangle of love triangles in the old west just before the Oklahoma territory joined the union. With the backdrop of the “range wars” between cowboys and farmers over water rights or grazing rights for the land.

Curly is a Cowboy, in love with a farmer’s daughter, Laurey. Jud is a farm hand working for Laurey’s Aunt Eller.

A box social dance that night, which includes an auction of lunch baskets prepared by the local girls to raise funds for a schoolhouse. The man who wins each basket will eat the lunch with the girl who prepared it. Curly asks Laurey to go with him and Laurey being coy refuses. Curly attempts to persuade her,("The Surrey with the Fringe on Top"). Laurey teases him about it, not realizing that Curly really has rented such a rig. Jud asks Laurey to the social and she says yes to spite Curly.

Cowboy Will Parker returns from a trip to modern Kansas City ("Kansas City"). He wins $50 at the fair, the exact amount he needs to marry his girl, Ado Annie. Unfortunately, in his excitement, Will spends all the money on gifts for Annie.

Later, Ado Annie confesses to Laurey she has been spending a lot of time with Ali Hakim, a Persian peddler. Insisting she loves them both, ("I Cain't Say No"). Laurey and her friends prepare for the social, while Gertie Cummings flirts with Curly (her obnoxious laugh floating in to taunt Laurey). Laurey tells her friends that she doesn't really care about Curly ("Many a New Day").

Ado Annie’s Farmer father discovers Annie with Ali Hakim, he institutes a ‘shotgun wedding’. Curly discovers Jud is Laurey’s escort to the and tries to convince her to go with him instead. Laurey tries to convince Curly she doesn’t love him ("People Will Say We're in Love"). Hurt by her refusal, Curly goes to the smokehouse to talk with Jud, suggesting the miserable man hang himself ("Pore Jud Is Daid"). After Curly leaves, Jud vows to make Laurey his bride.

In an extended dream ballet sequence, prompted by a potion given to Laurey by Ali Hakim, Laurey dreams of her marriage to Curly. Her dream takes a nightmarish turn when Jud appears and kills Curly. She cannot escape him, confused by her desires. Realizing Curly is the right man for her, Jud arrives to escort her to the dance.

At the social, during an upbeat square dance ("The Farmer and the Cowman"), the rivalry between the local farmers and cowboys surges, and Aunt Eller ends by firing a gun to silence everyone. Laurey is upset when she sees Curly at the dance with Gertie.

Ali Hakim buys Will's souvenirs from Kansas City for $50. The auction starts and Will bids $50 on Ado Annie's basket, not realizing that without the $50, he would no longer have the money her father insisted he needs to "purchase" marriage with her. Hakim saves the day with a bid of $51.

Laurey's basket comes up for auction. Having saved all of his money to ensure his winning, seems to outbid everyone until Curly sells his saddle, his horse, and even his gun to raise money. Curly finally outbids Jud and wins the basket.

Later that night, Will and Annie work out their differences, as she reluctantly agrees not to flirt with other men ("All Er Nuthin'"). Ali Hakim decides to leave the territory and bids Ado Annie goodbye after telling her Will is the man she should marry.

Jud confronts Laurey about his feelings for her and when she tells him the feeling is not mutual, Jud furiously threatens Laurey before he departs. Laurey runs to Curly in fear, he reassures her and proposes to her, and she accepts ("People Will Say We're In Love (Reprise)"). He then realizes that he must now become a farmer.

Laurey and Curly are married and everyone rejoices in celebration of the territory's impending statehood ("Oklahoma!"). During the celebration, Ali Hakim returns with his new shotgun wife, Gertie. A drunken Jud reappears, harasses Laurey by kissing her and attacks Curly with a knife. As Curly dodges a blow, Jud falls on his own knife and soon dies. The wedding guests hold a makeshift trial for Curly, at Aunt Eller's urging, as the couple is due to leave for their honeymoon. The judge, Andrew Carnes, declares the verdict: "not guilty!" Curly and Laurey depart on their honeymoon in the surrey with the fringe on top ("Finale Ultimo").

The love stories are simple, laughable and even sometimes sad (Poor Jud). The songs are catchy and will stay with you forever. One of my favorites and a great example of musical story telling is “The Farmer and the Cowman”. Below is the YouTube video from the original 1955 classic. Enjoy!!

A Mi'kmaq Tale : Rabbit and the Moon Man

Rabbit and the Moon Man

Long ago, Rabbit was a great hunter. He lived with his
grandmother in a lodge which stood deep in the Micmac forest. It was winter and Rabbit set traps and laid snares to catch game for food. He caught many small animals and birds, until one day he discovered that some mysterious being was robbing his traps. Rabbit and his grandmother became hungry. Though he visited his traps very early each morning, he always found them empty. 

 At first Rabbit thought that the robber might be a cunning wolverine, until one morning he found long, narrow footprints alongside his trap line. It was, he thought, the tracks of the robber, but they looked like moonbeams. Each morning Rabbit rose earlier and earlier, but the being of the long foot was always ahead of him and always his traps were empty.

Rabbit made a trap from a bowstring with the loop so cleverly fastened that he felt certain that he would catch the robber when it came. He took one end of the thong with him and hid himself behind a clump of bushes from which he could watch his snare. It was bright moonlight while he waited, but suddenly it became very dark as the moon disappeared. A few stars were still shining and there were no clouds in the sky, so Rabbit wondered what had happened to the moon. 

Someone or something came stealthily through the trees and then Rabbit was almost blinded by a flash of bright, white light which went straight to his trap line and shone through the snare which he had set. Quick as a lightning flash, Rabbit jerked the bowstring and tightened the noose. There was a sound of struggling and the light lurched from side to side. Rabbit knew b the tugging on his string that he had caught the robber. He fastened the bowstring to a nearby sapling to hold the loop tight.

Rabbit raced back to tell his grandmother, who was a wise old woman, what had happened. She told him that he must return at once and see who or what he had caught. Rabbit, who was very frightened, wanted to wait for daylight but his grandmother said that might be too late, so he returned to his trap line.

When he came near his traps, Rabbit saw that the bright light was still there. It was so bright that it hurt his eyes. He bathed them in the icy water of a nearby brook, but still they smarted. He made big snowballs and threw them at the light, in the hope of putting it out. As they went close to the light, he heard them sizzle and saw them melt. Next, Rabbit scooped up great pawfuls of soft clay from the stream and made many big clay balls. He was a good shot and threw the balls with all of his force at the dancing white light. He heard them strike hard and then his prisoner shouted.

Then a strange, quivering voice asked why he had been snared and demanded that he be set free at once, because he was the man in the moon and he must be home before dawn came. His face had been spotted with clay and, when Rabbit went closer, the moon man saw him and threatened to kill him and all of his tribe if he were not released at once.

Rabbit was so terrified that he raced back to tell his grandmother about his strange captive. She too was much afraid and told Rabbit to return and release the thief immediately. Rabbit went back, and his voice shook with fear as he told the man in the moon that he would be released if he promised never to rob the snares again. To make doubly sure, Rabbit asked him to promise that he would never return to earth, and the moon man swore that he would never do so. Rabbit could hardly see in the dazzling light, but at last he managed to gnaw through the bowstring with his teeth and the man in the moon soon disappeared in the sky, leaving a bright trail of light behind him.

Rabbit had been nearly blinded by the great light and his shoulders were badly scorched. Even today, rabbits blink as though light is too strong for their eyes; their eyelids are pink, and their eyes water if they look at a bright light. Their lips quiver, telling of Rabbit's terror.
The man in the moon has never returned to earth. When he lights the world, one can still see the marks of the clay which Rabbit threw on his face. Sometimes he disappears for a few nights, when he is trying to rub the marks of the clay balls from his face. Then the world is dark; but when the man in the moon appears again, one can see that he has never been able to clean the clay marks from his shining face.

————————

The Mi'kmaq Nation, is a member of the Wabanaki Confederacy. The Confederacy controlled northern New England and the Canadian Maritimes. The Micmacs are original natives of the Nova Scotia/New Brunswick region. They also settled in Quebec, Newfoundland, and Maine. Today, most Mi'kmaq people live on the Canadian side of the border, but the Aroostook Micmacs live in northeastern Maine.
The Micmac were great traders, carrying goods between northern tribes like the Innu and Cree and New England tribes like the Abenaki and Pennacook. They were also fierce warriors, fighting with the powerful Iroquois and the Beothuk of Newfoundland.

But their most important neighbors were the Maliseets,

Passamaquoddies, Abenakis, and Penobscots. These five tribes formed an alliance called the Wabanaki Confederacy. Before this alliance, the Micmacs were not always friends with these other tribes. Sometimes they even fought wars. But once they joined the Confederacy, the Wabanaki tribes never fought each other again, and are still allies today.

Anna Mae Pictou Aquash, the famous American Indian activist, was Mi'kmaq from Nova Scotia. She worked for Native American rights and an important figure in the American Indian Movement (AIM). In 1975 she was assassinated and the crime is still unsolved. Anna Mae is still an important figure for many Native Americans in the United States and Canada today.

To find out more about the Micmacs visit here.