S06E06: Sacred Waters: Trauma of the Erie Canal

A celebrated waterway can also be a wound. We open the Erie Canal’s familiar legend and find the story most of us never learned: how a triumph of engineering cut a dam through Haudenosaunee homelands, accelerated dispossession, and rewrote law, faith, and landscape in its wake. With Haudenosaunee leaders and scholars, we move from a condensed Thanksgiving Address into original instructions about water, winds, and the seven generations ethic, then confront the doctrine of Christian discovery—from papal bulls to Johnson v. M’Intosh—still echoing through U.S. property law.

Along the towpath, we trace the canal’s hidden cargo: land speculation, conflicts of interest, alcohol and other “mind changers,” and the quiet burial of treaty promises like Canandaigua’s “forever.” We connect those ruptures to the burned-over district, where new American religions—Latter-day Saints, Millerites, spiritualists, Shakers—flared as migrants grappled with dislocation and meaning. The canal didn’t just move grain; it moved imaginations, laws, and borders, often at the expense of communities who had long practiced diplomacy through the Great Law of Peace and the Two Row Wampum’s commitment to travel side by side without interference.

We also spotlight the Skä·noñh—Great Law of Peace Center’s work to flip the narrative on unceded Onondaga Nation territory, centering Indigenous values and living governance rather than artifacts. This is not nostalgia; it’s a practical invitation to measure progress by future faces, to see water as kin, and to treat treaties as living commitments. Press play to rethink what the Erie Canal made—and unmade—and to imagine a path from commemoration to repair. If this conversation moved you, subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave a review so more listeners can find these stories.

Transcript

Welcome And Purpose

Why Reframe The Canal’s Story

SPEAKER_01 0:30

Thanks everyone for coming. I'm Derek Frennett, Director of Education at the Erie Canal Museum, right here in Syracuse, New York. Thank you all for joining us today for Reflections on Erie's Waters. This is actually kind of a callback to the beginning of the Erie Canales Bicentennial eight years ago in 2017, where we also hosted a Reflections on Aries Water event right here, including the two speakers I'm going to introduce in a second. We'd like to thank you all for being here today. Thank you to the Scandal Brain Law Peace Center and the United Magnetic Historical Association for partnering with us to put this event to end. And also thank you to the Winterprint and the Villow Sloan Family Fund and Central New York Arts whose funding allowed this to happen. So the Erie Canal has been a transformative waterway in many ways, but traditionally that story has been told in an overwhelmingly positive light and from a very Eurocentric point of view. And this weekend was an ideal time to do that. If you are unaware, over in Amanda Lake Park, the Erie Canal Boat Seneca Chief is strengthened by the local maritime center that is parked there for the weekend as it travels across New York commemorating the bicentennial of the canal, replicating the Wake Clinton's original journey 200 years ago. We felt especially given the name of the boat that it was incredibly important to informing perspectives on this anniversary. Because again, the canal has been transformative. There's no doubt about that. But how we transform things are wrong-reaching and far-ranging, and there's a lot of different ways you can take them. And yeah, today we are going to have a series of different speakers. I also encourage you between breaks, um, check out the museum. We have some refreshments over there. Um we've also sent off some of you wanted to go over to the lake and check out the book. Um, um, among our first talk, um, Sacred Lumbers from the Erie Command. Um, it is my pleasure to introduce um Dr. Phil Arnold, who is a professor in the Department of Religion at Syracuse University. Um, he is the founding director of the Scanner Great Lama of Peace Center and um president of the Indigenous Values Initiative. Um, and he will be joined today as well by Jake Edwards. Um Jake is a member of the Anunaga Nation eel clan, uh, and he was appointed by the Grand Council of the Haw Nashwani Confederacy and the Hawanish External Relations Committee. Um, and additionally, he is on a board member of the Seventh Generation Fund for Indigenous Peoples and a board member of the Indigenous Values Initiative as well.

Seneca Chief Commemoration And Context

Introducing Speakers And Aims

Thanksgiving Address And Original Instructions

Water, Winds, Thunder Beings, And Balance

Doctrine Of Discovery And Early Violations

Great Law Of Peace And Two Row Wampum

Treaties Broken And Canal Expansion

Alcohol, “Mind Changers,” And Social Harm

Governance Borrowed, Promises Breached

Empire State, War, And Labor For The Canal

Disease, Settlements, And Dispossession

SPEAKER_04 3:49

Um give a quick translation so that we're all of the same mind as what we gather when we gather. We start off with a gunning menu, and we started off with the Seneca chief because it's in our waters again, and uh Tanawandas are close to the whole canal system as we are, and so they went first because uh it already had started the celebration in our eyes and in our hearts, it's it's a celebration of destruction and chaos, or the peace and contentment that was intended for us to be as we walk about here on Mother Earth. And so to start off, we start with a quick translation of Tutanohenu. We see some very familiar faces here, which most everybody will understand the Thanksgiving address is the words before all else. It starts off with the people that are gathered and that were well enough to attend. We kindly and respectfully put our minds together as one and give a gratitude to all that's here in attendance, and so we let it be that way in our minds, and we direct our thoughts to Mother Earth, Mother Earth who carries on the responsibility, the original instructions to provide for us. Beings. When we talk about the beings, we're talking about the animal beings and the tree beings and all beings, and that we know all of our relations as we know. We all need each other, and so the work that our grant our mother earth has been summoned to provide for us is still going on, so therefore, we kindly respectfully put our minds together as one and give a great gratitude to our mother the earth, still carrying on with your instructions, and so let it be that way in our minds, and we direct our thoughts to the to the plants, to the medicines, we condense this gun of hand here, this Thanksgiving address, which we've been doing with these gatherings because we're all going by the clock now, not going by the daylight, the number of sleeps we go by the hours on the clock, so we condense this down because sometimes this Thanksgiving address can last into over an hour, depending on the speaker and the fine detail that they put in to all the birds' responsibilities, and how many to bring us peace and we listen to them, not only to transport and deliver seeds to these communities as they carry about their livelihood. It is up to the speaker to include these details, these fine details. Some speakers are getting into the currents of the waters and how they flow and where they flow and how it conduits itself into the life of the new leaves of the trees and the plants and the foods that we eat. But since we're on the clock here, we have to cut it short so you can just put your mind in your gratitude to the animals and the plants and the birds and the waters that are still carrying on their duties the best that they can, given the circumstances that we're all in these times. And so we let it be that way in our minds, and we conduct, direct our thoughts now to our elder brother, the son, who without fail provides his work for us to warm our bodies, warm the earth to help growth, warm the earth so the plants can grow, warm our bodies, bring us the daylight. And so we direct our thoughts now also to the winds, winds that come in, the gentle breezes transport the airflow for us for all of us, all of us beings, and also we understand that the winds can be very strong and powerful at times, and we we remind with gratitude for them to take it easy that the winds be gentle winds come through, and so we also acknowledge the thunder beings that carry the waters and the great responsibility that they have, that they're still coming from the west. There may be a time when the thunder's come from the east, and that time is letting us know when that happens, that the change is about to come, and that we're already prepared because we share the gratitude that will give us at this time, but our time to walk about here on Mother Earth. And so we kindly and respectfully put our minds together as one and give a great gratitude to the Thunder Beings who are still carrying on their duties and bringing waters and rains that's replenishing Mother Earth's energies to grow and provide for us as we walk about in peace and contentment to let it be that way in our minds. We direct our thoughts to the four beings, four beings who have control of our thoughts, help guide our thoughts, four beings who remind us of what we're to be grateful for each and every day, each and every day that we wake up and we give gratitude to the morning sons, that we see the plant life and that we hear the birds, and four messengers who are with us in our minds and in our hearts and in our bodies each and every day. Help direct us to making the right decisions and stirring us away from the wrong decisions as we walk about here on the earth. Let it be that winds and winds. We direct our thoughts now to the creator, creator who would put down and establish all the bounties that we would need to survive in peace and content prior to us being here, and what he had set down there for the instructions of working and living together in peace and harmony as we walk about, and also he sat down, and what we see still going on today is the great love he has for the people, for the beings, for each other, that is still going on, but we need to spread that a little bit wider throughout our peoples. Times are changing our thoughts and our thought patterns, and some of it is directly involved with the expansion and the people that are leaving their own homelands and not having gratitude and paying attention to the ancestors of where their original people are from. They're expanding and leaving them behind. So it's hard now in our minds and in our hearts to share what the Creator has set down for us, share love for one another and to never forget our ancestors. America was built on people looking for a freedom, right? We know that from the history books and so forth. We don't hear in the history books or even in contemporary times how many people are going trying to get back home. Our ancestors are feeling that. Your ancestors are feeling that it takes a lot to understand your roots, follow your roots, acknowledge your roots, what brought you here wasn't a Seneca chief. It was a search for what we still share today as Bono Shoney, Hodino Shoney. My people are Buenoshone people of Alongos. French call us Iroquois, English call us, six nations. Other people call us other things. We know who we are. We know where our ancestors are. Development. Doesn't start with Clinton. It starts far before that, two hundred years before that, with the doctrine of discovery, Christian doctrine of the scope. It's devastating to the world what the Erie Canal did to our house here in Hodin Shone. Our house, the Mother Earth is the floor, the eastern woodlands are our walls, the skies are ceiling. With open arms and open hands and heart, we invite people to follow and seek shelter under the great tree of peace was brought to us over a thousand years ago. So when we talk about the uh the Erie Canal and the prosperous, greatest achievement in America to grow America. It's devastating to the Hodin Oshone homelands, right through our house. Largest water dam in history cut our house right in the middle. Cuts out all the four leggets in their homelands too. Rabbits, squirrels, all these animals know their home as their home. Return to their home of their ancestors. It was a plan, it was a destiny, manifest destiny. People in search of themselves and not looking at their own home. Develop and grow. In our minds, back in that day when we met, we felt that it was they were in search of peace. And that they had followed the white roots of peace of the great tree peace that was planted right here on Dogalake. So we accepted and shared. One of the first things we share with them is the Thanksgiving. Not the one that happens in November. One that's publicized as uh America's Thanksgiving Day. Thanksgiving, for lack of a better translation to English, is our bodies connecting to all that's provided for us to live, be at peace and contentment, and to acknowledge it, like we're to acknowledge our ancestors and where our roots come from, and to share, share with them Thanksgiving address, which is the fundamental rules, laws. Those are kind of words that short change the meaning of life, rules and laws. The original teachings that were taught and shared with us came in the bundle, bundle that the sky woman brought, destination of developing the world we know of today. Sky Woman, she's referred to as we get into the depths of it, and she had a destination, she had a responsibility, and she carried that out. And in that bundle that she brought with her, along the leaders of the food source that kept us all around, good health, the three sisters, the corn beans and the squash, and the tobacco for communication, which we still all use today. So when you talk about these people that are looking for peace and freedom, as I said, and left their ancestral landscape in search that they brought with them, devastating the peace of Turtle Island. Now, as beings, yes, we have our differences here and there. There is diplomatic ways to be solved, but it's just part of the fundamental original instructions of harmony. So along with this canal, so they start talking about this canal and how when we talk about our history as beings and the original instructions, we can we can stay on that for days on that because it affects each and every one of us today. The instructions of yesterday. Fundamentally, when we fail to acknowledge them, you become lost, become lost in many, many ways. Put things in front of you, put things first that shouldn't be because one of the fundamental rules in column if I'm looking for another term for English with original instructions is that the decisions that you make today as individuals, as leaders, as just beings. You're in a governmental position and you're governing people, and the decisions that you make today are to no way negatively affect seven generations coming. It's our responsibility to look out for seven generations coming. It's our turn here, and our decisions are crucial for the generations and face is yet to come. We talk about sky beans, like I say, we cut short the gun of handy and we talk about the responsibilities of Grandmother Moon. She has the great responsibility of the water currents and the water flows. All of them. Sacredness of water we're reminded of. The sacredness of the water that each and every one of us were in for some for nine months prior to even taking a breath. It's her responsibility. Flows of occurrence, it's her responsibility. So we acknowledge that. Come into our house hungry and meet. Some records, history records, don't tell it off. We're only hungry and weak and struggling to survive. Brought with them, some of their biggest supplies they brought with them is alcohol. Rump. It was supposed to soothe them. We all know the effects of it. It changes your mind. That's the name we gave when we met alcohol. The got niggas. It changes your mind. To make good decisions for future generations under the influence, devastating as we see today. Devastating. What's our responsibility to provide for future generations when you make those kind of decisions? So as we met these people, now we're skipping a whole century of discussions with these people, these new newcomers. Because we're here to talk about the canal. So when you look at it, the canal prior to the canal was the land. You got these laws that they came over with doctrine of Christian discovery. The ship landed Turtle Island, they had a doctrine with them stating that any lands that they find uninhibited by Christians. There's no Christians there, and they have the rights to it. Bill can get into more detail of that. And it's something that really has to be looked into to pass on the truth. Generations coming so that we don't keep making the same mistake. So these people do that were in charge of making decisions for the newcomers and all when skenectati, it's called skenectati on the other side of the pines, skenectity, where the decision makes going on with the continental congress and these people. We have to keep going back to it to catch on. So in this um discussion, how much time we got here, but this is who we are. This could take eight, ten days to explain it. And then we have to translate. So that you can have help reach out to the ones who need it. That's that human being part of it. It's in here, it's all in this law. Laws of short games interpretation of it in English. This is what we would call the Dainas, great law of peace, lack of better translation. It's all of what was given to us, it was all of what we feel, and it was all of how we help each other. That we didn't understand. But what we did understand is they're like us, they got five fingers, they got ears, they got eyebrows, same features, just look a little different. What we did know is that they need help because they're following the roots of peace. That's what we thought. But what we've learned was there was no peace and friendship and little ships coming over, and so once they got established and they put their uh foundation work in and their shelter well, you start arguing amongst each other. Well, what to follow, religion-wise, especially religion. Religion is supposed to be the word of peace and love and happiness. It's one of the most life-taking arguments in the world, is Christianity. That's what came over, too. I was one of the first invasive species was Christianity. So getting to the Erie Canal as they're getting making up paperwork to say they got legal right to the land, that was a case it wasn't too long ago, 1926, the Supreme Court case in Rochester, because Massachusetts and New York were still arguing over who has who owns the land in Rochester. Massachusetts, if you remember in the history of books, playing all the way over to the Pacific Ocean. And on paper said they were right, it all belongs to Massachusetts. That decision was made in some bar room, saloon, gymnal, whatever they call them, gathering spouse. And they said that they can rightfully take the land away from the native inhabitants legally, they can take the land if we leave them and rods from the builds, and yards, and rods. I don't know how long a rod is, but it doesn't sound like too much. In which they did and started building models. So, anyways, uh jumping a little bit further. We we came up with an agreement with them when we first met, when we first met. This is a hundred years after they landed here, but their diseases, many different diseases. Alcoholism is a disease too, right? Brought to have he legalized it, legalized disease, alcoholism. All the young people over there take their money. Not illegalizing the other digni, they got they got neguhedaneus, digini is two. They got neguhedenus is what mind changers changes your mind. Now you can go and smoot some poison weed legally, like alcohol. You wonder why people aren't doing things out there, why they don't work, why they don't have gardens anymore. This can now build so that they can progress, develop progress, industries, industries that Anheiser Busch, like that. They're showing them cute little cults pushing kegs around that still attach the younger minds to that name, to that brand. Keep making these same mistakes, getting programmed by the programmers on TV, multimedia, whatever you call that, spending it, programming for children. I don't know how much time I got. I don't take all Phil's time up either. He's got a lot of knowledge to share. But when you're talking about the newcomers, and we notice that they're gonna stay, we come up with an agreement. This is with the Dutch traders, the industry against we found them on the shores of uh of the Mohawk community over in this area, and so each nation, each one of our five nations. This was established over a thousand years ago, and I keep going back because it's information that you're not gonna find in history books. Passed on, and it's repetitive. You hear it now, you might hear it next week, next month, you hear it again and again. Like they're gonna hand you every gathering, large or small, ceremonial, socials, meetings, you hear that Thanksgiving over and over again. It's repetitive, oral teachings. Oral teachings. We're reminded over and over again, and before you can go and talk, you have to have clear mind in English they call it a good head, with good mind, good thoughts, good head. You have a good head, you got a bad head, you can't put this out there. You have a selfish head, you can't put this out there. Because part of the planting of the tree of peace here was to stop argument, warfare, and you buried the weapons of war underneath the great white pine, so that future generations won't see that what we've learned from. And that's what I'm saying is when you keep doing it and you're not learning from it, there's a definition to that. So we saw or weapons of war be buried under the tree of peace. Weapons of war are grief, jealousy, dishonesty. Those are what starts wars. That's what starts the world, you know. Disrespect to one another, those are weapons of war, those are to be buried. See that happen? We share that over and over again, and so we shared with these newcomers the fundamental laws of living in our house, eastern woodlands. Now we have agreements and understandings all around us. The English fellows the sixth nation because the Tuscaror nation is also seeking shelter way down south. This message of peace and unity expands, and you can follow it. As far as the pine tree grows, the great white pine tree grows, and when you go back to the Gangnohan, the Thanksgiving address, we talk about each one, has a leader, right? All the berries have a leader, strawberries, the leader, big willow, the leader of the medicines, maple trees, the leader of the forest, leader of the trees. So, as far as what you call the sugar maple, it's good medicine, good medicine comes in. As far as that grows, as far as the white pine grow, they're about the same distance from here. So when you look at the written history, there's six nations, six nations Iroquois confederacy, or when you listen to the oral teachings, there's hundreds of nations that came under this. Weren't written down because that's pre-historic. We're prehistoric, according to the education system in America. We're pre-historic. So what occurred and who joined our Confederacy? Wasn't written down, so it don't count. Only count six of us because that's when they start writing it. 1613 we met with uh the Dutch. We came up with this agreement. It's called the Gospel. It's a two-row. Prior to that, it's explained in here about the fire. So each nation has their own fire, right? Like us, like I was saying earlier, I didn't get to the ending of it. There never is an ending. We're going, we're growing. Don't stop. It's if another nation was to seek shelter to all the white woods of peace, there's room to add to the rafters of our long hops, expand a house, which we did many, many times. Of living because they stayed here longer than stayed here too long. But when we noticed they weren't leaving, we had to come up with an agreement with them, and so we came up with this agreement. Very beginning, there's no end again. But as you begin, we talk about the one row, is one boat that they came in, and all their religions and their laws and their ways of life are in that boat, in that vessel, and the other row represents our canoe, and all our ways, and our songs, dance, ceremonies, and so forth are in that canoe. And we agreed that we would not interfere with each other's ways, but we would agree also that we would travel the river of life side by each for as long as the sun shines from the east and sets in the west, for as long as water flows downhill, and for as long as the grass grows green, the disagreement will be in effect. Forever. Once we noticed that they weren't leaving, and this came about because as they were trapping and gathering and getting riding their country supplies that we found here, trade trade supplies. So when it comes to the law here, that the Mohawks have their council of chiefs, the Naidas, and Nagas, Pivas, Seneca all have their own council of chiefs. And so anything that is of their matters will stay within their council. Anything that is just outside maybe affects the United States, in which the Dutch and the fur trade and all that start affecting them all happening in Mohawk country for a number of years. Then the Unidas started noticing them coming in. That's when it happened. So that's why we came up with it with this Google agreement. So as we as we talk, now we can get into the great law of peace, but right now we're supposed to be here on the Erie Canal. The Erie Canal after the government, because you have to understand the formation of the United States. We shared with them exactly how to conduct diplomacy to the guy in SAT Bona. How to establish a governance? Because in the history book, excuse me, in the archives, it's not in the history books in schools, but in the archives, the notes in the legislature, the governing bodies of the colonies were uh discussing how can five savage nations live so far apart from each other yet be governed under one government. So they said we have to find out. So they came and asked us. They asked us how it works. And so again, we shared with them the laws living in our house. The diplomacy. There's a lot of fine details. We won't be able to get into today. But what we did was help them establish what today is known as the Constitution of the United States. What happens if you violate the Constitution? What happens? Nothing. Right? You're on your own. Somebody might not like you anymore. You're in violation of the Constitution. Constitution is supposed to be the fundamental laws of your government. And but there's no disciplinary action for violating it. Honor system, yes. Well, we have some. This could be considered the constitution, but it already has been considered the um first draft of the American Constitution new year. There was a congressional act in 1988 to recognize Woody Moshone's contributions to the Constitution of the United States. Well, the peacemakers brought this message to us, and we weren't getting along very well with each other, bloodstreams and ground. So without getting in on all the fine detail that the oral teaching tells us, when we come together, we accepted this message of peace. One example that the peacemaker expressed to us is one arrow from each nation. Your arrow is your livelihood, it's your defense, it's your food source. Take one arrow, and you can be broken in that, just like that, snapping that. Take one arrow from each nation and bind it together with all the procedures, protocols, ceremonies, Thanksgiving addresses, responsibilities, the and the law of this one. You bind it with the Sinu, the leader of the four-legged, the sinu of the deer. Bind them five arrows together with all the laws, original teachings, ceremonies, and you bind them tightly, and no man can break that bundle. That bundle is right together, unified as one, one body of arrows. Just to give a brief history again, that's not in the history books, but it's in the archives. Some of our friends that like to read found out that the colonies, the 13 colonies, used to call themselves the 13 councils of fire. Following this each council has their own fire. And so when we gather as five nations, in which we had to do in order to come up with this, great importance. We had a grand council. So if you uh want to get back to the Erie Canal, you gotta first learn the history of the water itself, which was a good reminder there. And so when I was talking about the 13 councils of fire and what they took from us, our advice to them, and I think it was in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, a meeting with the Continental Congress or representatives or whoever it was. This is when they told us that we're gonna take your advice and we're gonna build government like yours, and so they asked us again to come to Albany, it's connected, and share with them again. So we did, and they formed us, and so, anyways, jumping ahead another another little bit. I gotta get to this one here because this is part of the Erie Canal. This is George Washington. George Washington was a land speculative, as were many of his close, his team, his brothers, he had brothers that were land speculators all around the Hoodie Massoni, all around us in Kentucky, Ohio, and all throughout people are buying land off of Massachusetts as individuals. So the Dutch developed this Holland Land Company, Dutch investors. They start buying up land, but the Erie Canal was was um successful in part because of the Dutch the Holland Land Company that was buying land off of um Massachusetts, and so in turn, the Holland Land Company donated or somehow maybe not donated, but it was a hundred thousand acres that were turned over to the canals to help fill the canal right through Seneca, that's where Tanawanda was talking about, all three villages, correct violation of the United States word peace and friendship in the Canadega Treaty, which is George Washington commissioned by Timothy Pickering Timothy Pickering was commissioned to treat with the Hudinoshone for peace and friendship. What's that word? Perpetuity, perpetuity, yes, that means forever, right? I like the grass growing green and the water flowing downhill and the sun shining from the east better than that word. And so, but that's where it comes from. That's where the foundation of it comes from, forever, peace and friendship. So this represents um 13 ounce of fire, and the arms are locked, signifying their unity, what they learned from here, and then they asked us for peace. There's 13 of them, but there's also 14, 15. So you got the keepers of the eastern door, the Mohawk Nation, and the keepers of the Western Doors, the Seneca Nation, and you got their long house in the middle, but you also have a double house. You got the long house and the capital of the United States as one. This is what this about is telling you. You got two houses here, one fire. That we would work together, that we won't have to go to war if we stay at peace. This is our argument in the 70s and so forth with the draft. We can't be drafted into your war because we stayed out of nothing world. War over land. There's a lot to say about that war over land. So the Erie Canal happened in violation of this treaty. The treaty was 1794. George Washington signed it. George Washington tried to eliminate us 20 years prior to that, for less. 15 years. Three-bodied government. They understood the concept of our house. Not the government standard, everything's for the government. What they left out was one of the main things in governance is the women. Women choose the leaders in Toby Muffoni. For a very good reason. Women are closest to Mother Earth, closest to the children. You watch the children grow, they understand if that's gonna be a good leader or not. Remember now we gotta go all the way back to the beginning. From Sky Woman as she's dancing across and spreading the soil to grow Hertle Island what it is. There's so much, like I said, that you're not gonna be giving. Because we're on the clock, you've got the Yuri Canal guy looking at me. Which they did not gonna get into all the uh just campaigning of it and all George Washington visited this area, and he's coming across and he's standing on a drumlin. Him and um Moses, Moses the wet Moses. Well, he's surveying surveyor, and he says, and he's standing on a drumlin here on Idle Lake, and he looks across and says, This is where I'm gonna build my empire. Build my empire. There was one problem. We were in a way, we became New York State's Indian problem, and I still think we're considered that today. It's New York State's Indian problem. Getting rid of us like they're planned to. So they said that this is where he's gonna build his uh empire, copying the Roman Empire, maybe copying some kind of empire. But that's why they say today, that's why it's on New York State license place, the empire state. That was the plan, build the empire here. Well, when they decided to build that canal because of the wars, there's wars going on with uh with their brothers, brothers are fighting brothers, right? Britain and English, same families, same people, same boat, different color coat, but they kept turning changing colors, and so they're convincing the people that they needed to spend their money to build this canal for expansion for not only for war supplies, but to expand industry, and so when they were doing that, they had a bunch of uh after the war of uh you see who was it, the British, the British, they were fighting. British had hired a whole bunch of um mercenaries from Germany, hate them to come and fight for the British. America beat them out, kept them captive, and then used them to build a canal. Some of them German, some of them Irish, and the influx of immigrants, which came to a halt. This administration started way back then. So in New York City, they're bringing all these people from all over the world, and then at the same time, they're talking about they need workers to build this, so they brought in a whole bunch of them disease-infected people coming through what is now known as the Erie Canal. The settlers are moving into towns, just taking over in violation forever, undisturbed promises of George Washington that this land will not be taken from us. So when you look at the Constitution and we violate the constitution, what couldn't you go to? Who do you complain to? The violator, so we did 1794 was this uh treaty in November 11th, December 1794. Letters were sent to George Washington, 1795 letters were sent to George Washington. Your people are violating your treaty. His response was it's true he has a few bad bad boys or whatever he called them, bad boys, and that he can't control all these people. Well, if he can put together a couple thousand bad men to go and destroy our crops, he could surely could have put together a couple guys to go talk to these bad guys and tell them to get off of that land, it's not America. That didn't happen because he had another plan going back to the doctrine of discovery. Went back to the doctrine of this is all their land. We have no right to own it. We only have right of occupancy, according to Marshall, Eric Jordan. Come Marshall. So, what I'm getting at is the destruction and the devastation that the Erie Canal had caused, bringing in the boatloads of smallpox and malaria, many more. As they got to the lakes of uh Lake Ontario, what their destination was, opened up the Great Lakes to all these settlers, and along with them bringing in all these diseases. So once they learned that those smallpox is killing off our people, along with the alcohol, the rum, and the whiskies, and this trade, a lot of this stuff isn't reported because it doesn't look good on the funders, doesn't look good on the the tourists to get on the canal and travel to the Great Lakes. A lot of these boats were denied even to port in these newly established. Settlement is a that means you agree, right? We'll settle. All these newcomers, colonizers, they in the history books they call them settlements, you know, all these new settlements came across about who did they settle with indigenous people. Look at the land is not for sale, you can't sell your mother. And so when they were first making these according to the United States government messages and notes of the presidents stated in there that Congress appropriated money to help New York State pay for its quasi treaties, was I treaties because they knew that New York State couldn't make treaties, only the United States cared. Another federal law that they violated, but then they turned a blind eye to it because of the industrial move. So when you look at the Erie Canal, it was devastating to America in more ways than just to the Native Americans, the indigenous populations. And it's still going on today through the same channels of waterways, unregulated. Well, you guys, I can go on for days on this stuff because we haven't even got into the smaller details of this agreement of the Canada. We got a little bit touched in on the violations of it, violated it right away. You look across the Erie Canal violated the Fort Stanwick's treaty. A nation is only as good as its word. Contamination, not to put it personal to you guys, it's your government. We had a treaty back in um New York State. In Massachusetts, made a treaty. Treaty of Hartford. And then that treaty it was about the Pequot. Between New York State and Massachusetts. No, there were three different treaties called Hartford. The first one was Pequot Wars. You heard about that in the history books a little bit. Without detail. History. Not necessarily how it happened. Not necessarily what happened, but that's his story. So the Treaty of Hartford was where they outlawed the word Higwa. And they outlawed Pequot, only land. And they outlawed the Piquot language that he's spoken in any manner. Today we hear about devastations, but you don't hear a remedy. Well rally your brains a little bit and uh come to a close with let's find a strategy so that we can all live side by each in peace and friendship forever.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:45

Do you need help catching up on today's topic? Or do you want to learn more about the resources mentioned? If so, please check our website at podcast.doctrine of discovery.org for more information. If you like this episode, review it on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Calling For Truth And Strategy

Resource Plug And Transition

Flipping The Narrative At Skä·noñh

SPEAKER_03 1:08:02

And now back to the conversation, well, I have I have a number of slides, I like PowerPoint, but uh it gives me a kind of rough idea of what I want to say and how I want to say it. But uh Jake filled in most of the most of the broad strokes of what I want to talk about. Um I want to thank Derek and Steph uh mostly for putting that together. Um thanks to the Sloan Foundation for supporting this event. Um thanks to Lisa, who was here just now, but uh Lisa and Ronnie and all the folks here at uh at the Scano Center. Um it's nice to see Dan and Gail here because we're talking about the doctrine of discovery way back when we started Discovery Group with my wife Sandy Bigtree. So um this is a real honor to be here uh at this time. So I want to start with this image because um this is another image by Brandon Lazor, who also did the artwork calls here uh at the Scano Center. Uh, this is another rendering of the peacemaker coming across the Onondaga Lake uh in the Whitestone Canoe. And what I what I like about this image is that all of these, it's part of the story is that these sort of um deterrents were thrown up in his way of bringing the great peace to the to the Hudnishone. And so that's represented by these waves and stormy conditions of the of the uh peacemaker. It's you could say it's another craft in Onondaga Lake, uh, which represents another completely uh different story that I think we have to pay more attention to these days. Oh yes, hold on. This one? Yep, yeah, great. So uh just making um um Jake's point again, um I like to show this image and to my students at Syracuse University because um we live in a what we could call a sacred geography that's always connected to water in a variety of different waterways. Um so the peacemaker journeys all through this area. Uh, and then uh finally it's established here at Onadoga Lake uh as the Great Peace. Um so many things I want to talk to you about. But um uh as the founding director of the Scano Center, um we uh made some decisions which uh had to do with dealing with the French fort, which is out back. Um it's closed now in perpetuity. Um so uh so the the French fort celebrated this 20 less than 20 months of the coming of the Jesuits into Onadauga Nation territory uh between um what is it uh 1656 and 58. Um and I want to talk a little bit about that. Uh the French colonial government gave them, granted them Onondaga Nation territory, you know, land grant, which I'll talk about in a minute. Um, and that's an example of the doctrine of Christian discovery that I want to talk about. Um the French fort, the reproduction of the French fort, is originally built in 33. It's iconic here in Syracuse. A lot of people come back to see the fort. Um, and then Saint Marie in the 70s really it expanded in the 90s, uh, becomes uh a living museum. They have reenactors and things like that in the French fort. Um, and in 2011 it closes, and we decide, well, working with uh Onondaga Historical Association, um, we uh create a collaborative uh to represent the Onondaga Nation story, the Wooden Shoney story here at the Scanos, right? So we've flipped the narrative, flipped the script uh here at uh Onondaga Lake. We're really quite pleased and proud of that fact, and trying to bring the presence of the Onondaga Nation back to Onondaga Lake because we are on unceded nation territory, right? Um the county claims to own it, but uh given Jake's narrative, I can understand why this is a contentious thing. We opened in 2015, so we've been open 10 years. Um I'm no longer directly involved. We've got Joey Hill and his son Joey. Uh Emerson Shenandoah uh is now the director here at the Scannison. So this is the collaborative, it was a wide-ranging collaborative. It was both uh academics um and uh the county, um, Anandog Historical Association, etc., and then uh the Onondaga Nation. So that the nature of that collaborative was pretty complicated to sort of keep together. Um, and thankfully it kind of ruined our health, quite frankly. And and now I'm um uh I'm happy to pass it off. But this uh this this is the two-row waltham that Jake was referring to. Um, he told you the story of the agreement, which is important, but for us, it was like a working document, right? It was a way that we try work together. It doesn't always work out, but we try to collaborate uh around uh this now. I talk a lot about collaboration because it's difficult to pull off oftentimes. Um it's uh uh for academics, you're never in charge of your own uh material, uh, which drives academics crazy, frankly. So it's a very different way of working, and um I've tried to bring that into um um Syracuse University. All right, so the um the interactions of the the Hunishone extend over an enormous uh uh geographical area from Nova Scotia to you know um the uh the watershed of the Mississippi River through the Ohio Valley, through the Great Lakes, and um south into what's now Georgia. Uh Jake referred to it as the extent of the of where the Great White Pine grows. Um, and that's sort of the geographical extent. I grew up in Michigan. Um Sandy and I go to a little uh place here in the lower peninsula, like there. And there are Hud Noshone names of streets up there uh in Michigan. So we know that the the extent of the influence was was very powerful and um you know um referred to as kind of under the wing of the Hud Noshone. We cover a lot of ground here at the Scano Center. I hope that you'll come back or you'll have some time today to really visit the different units or the different uh stations of the Scano Center to learn more about this. But um in the in the final uh room, we talk about how it inspired Western democracy. That that's what uh Jake was talking about, the women's movement and the cross, among other things. So three ways that Onondaga Lake is culturally important, culturally distinct. The founding of the Great Law of Peace. Um, dating this has been a tricky business, but it's largely agreed that it's well before 909, common era, contact with Jesuit missionaries, which I'll talk about in a minute, and then also a central stop on the Erie Canal, which we're all talking about today, right? So you can see from the Punishoni perspective why this looks like a dam, a water dam, right up right through their territory. Okay, so one of the things that I would like for us to be aware of as we go through um the the um sort of the triumphal history of the Seneca chief and the um uh Erie Canal is that it wasn't the only boat in um 200 years ago that was sailing along the Erie Canal. And the Erie Canal folks, Derek in particular, knows more about this than I do. But I just want to mention that there was also a boat called Noah's Ark that sailed along um along with the Seneca chief. Because I'm in religion, I pay attention to these kind of references. Um and uh according to the New York Times recent New York Times article, Noah's Ark actually carried members to Seneca boys of the Choni tell them tribe. They shared the vessel with eagles, deer, and bear as part of a dehumanizing side show. Not my words, that's the New York Times. So what's going on here? I'm I'm asking. Um, you know, I really don't know, but this is a very interesting kind of framing of the Erie Canal opening up the Wild West or something, right? So what's what's happening in the minds or the imaginations of these people that are involved in um celebrating um this achievement? Also, um, another Seneca nation, not the Tanawanda Seneca, uh fashioned what they call the wampum belt, commemorating the Seneca chief. Okay, and you can imagine that there's quite a difference of opinion of how this would be a kind of celebratory act, you know, in terms of in terms of commemorating the the canal. That's another discussion I think we need to have, although I'm just putting it out. All right. So this is an old book now called Conspiracy of Interests, Iroquois Dispossession and the Rise of New York State by Larry Hauptman. Um it's already uh a kind of old book, but Larry talks quite a lot about the Erie Canal and how it was specifically involved with the dispossession of the Windishun, very specifically. That was the intention of the canal, and that's and these these kinds of um frameworks, then, like Memozar, were intentionally there to um destroy the Wooden Showing. Uh we talked about Simon DeWitt, the wit. Uh he was a New York State Board of Canal Commissioners, New York State Surveyor, 1784 to the 1830s. He also worked with or for the Holland Land Company of the Governor, and he was invested in flipping lands. This is a real textbook case of nepotism and conflicts of interest uh that were all about the all about the canal. Now, in Larry's Larry's book, he he cites this, and I'd like for you to look at Erie in particular, right? So, in um according to the demographics of the time in the 18 in 1800s, according to this map, there is nobody living in Erie at the time. So who comes as people, right? And who doesn't, right, in the history of the Canada. And then in Erie, in by 1855, there's you know 132,000 people. Now, Larry Hopkins claims that this was uh intentionally to dispossess uh the Huddin Shomey to move white people essentially into their territories, and that that was the whole intention, particularly around Buffalo.

Canal As Dam: Conflicts Of Interest

unknown 1:21:10

All right.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:10

Now I want to talk about something else because it hasn't been mentioned. We went in early meetings with uh people who are commemorating uh the Erie Canal. Uh they said they weren't going to talk about religion. Now I felt like that you know was a personal uh diss on me because the Erie Canal is so important for American religion, right? And and it still reverberates today. Um, so many different religions are, well, we could say pop out of the canal various ways, right? Um, of course, uh uh you know, uh Mormons or Latter-day Saints in Palmyra. Um, I talked to this, we we we talked to people coming from foreign countries about the Mormons getting their start here. They said that we're a long way from Salt Lake. Yes, we are, but you know, Palmyra is the place where Joseph Smith receives the revelations from those golden plates, right? Millerites, right, around um around Albany area. These are the people that um were convinced the end of the world. And the end of the world kind of theology or apocalyptic thinking is what kind of defines uh American religion in so many ways. Of course, and I think it was around 1843, something like that, that they predicted the the end of the world was going to happen. Um it didn't, uh just so you know, and then uh but this kind of morphs into Seventh-day Adventists, uh Jehovah's Witness, uh, other traditions that are still very much alive and with us today. Um I think a couple of weeks ago people were predicting the end of the world too. So it's not something that had that people have given up on. Now, why this is an important framework for religious uh the religious religious imagination around the Erie Canal is an interesting question. What does the Erie Canal have to do with the end of the world? Shakers, the Fox sisters, of course, the you know, the spiritualists. Steph has a nice picture of them in her office, the Shakers, uh Oneida community, these kind of um strange utopian experiments with you know complicated marriage and things like that. Um I'm claiming that these are all responding to some kind of traumatic conditions that I think Jake was alluding to, frankly. All right, these traumatic conditions of many, many different languages, of different people, different heritages jammed together in, frankly, what would be seen as the middle of nowhere, um, and somehow making a life, a meaningful life away from home, you know. So, so or I could put it this way people don't create religions if everything's great, right? They make religion when things are dramatically wrong and threatening and scary, you know, right? So I think that the the canal uh needs to be investigated more. It's been referred to as the burned over district because of the religious fervor through the canal zone, but I think it needs to be um thought through a little more, and um there are some students that I'm working with that are interested in yeah, I'm not familiar with the burned over district relationship to the king on the it's really just the canal zone, the burned over.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:03

Can then work?

SPEAKER_03 1:25:05

Yeah, I mean it's all during the 19th century. There are these different religions that come into being right along the canal zone, yeah. Yeah, so they refer to it as the burned over districts, kind of like associated with what's called the second great awakening in American religious history. So kind of the Bible belt, but they're making up their own Bibles in a way, okay? Um, and so and it just comes out of these kind of fiery imaginations that I think are fascinating. By the way, this is our religion partner. We would go take these pilgrimages and go to the uh they no longer have the Hilcomoral pageant, but um, we went to those several times, and students and our family were just amazed.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:54

It came out of the sports shirt, right?

Religion Along The Canal: Burned-Over District

Personal Lineage, Manifest Destiny, And Memory

SPEAKER_03 1:25:59

Yeah, still yeah, sports shirt. So uh my own family. So Sandy and I are also investigating uh something else that Jake was talking about as how um we can investigate our own lineage and how we're connected to this, to this, uh these historical realities, right? And I found some very interesting and important. This this is the book we're writing. I I can talk to a lot more on this, but I'll just I'll just mention this. So, you know, Daniel Arnold, Revolutionary War veteran, I suspect might have been involved in the Clinton, Sullivan Clinton uh campaign, but he was a surveyor in 1811, well before the uh the uh the the canal um in what's now just west of Rochester, right? And it's called Ogden. And my third great-grandfather, Aaron Arnold, this is his his uh his tombstone, um ran a still along the Erie Canal, and that was his livelihood for the you know until he died in like 1860, right? So again, going back and referencing what Jake is talking about, it's an odd kind of genealogy I'm doing. I'm interested in kind of these terrible stories of my family. Um, and then the second great-grandfather father Henry S, who is the genealogist in the family, he goes west along the canal and then um dies in um Michigan, right? This is an example of manifest destiny right along the canal. And then you have to ask yourself, well, why am I doing this then? You know, why am I back here thinking about this, right? So these kind of gene, it's a way of doing genealogy that's a little more connected to. The colonial uh frameworks that we are that we currently live in, right? All right, so lots of Arnold's. Uh, we were just at an Arnold House yesterday in uh Rhode Island, right? So we go all the way back referencing the Pequot Massacre, or what's called the Pequot Wars, and the first John John Arnold back. So lots of things to think about. This is Aaron Arnold's home in Ogden. It's now the Historical Society and Museum. And we had a very interesting day talking to the to the person there. Anyway, that's enough of that. Okay, so so at at the Scano, at Scano, we we focus on values, and I wanted to talk about that. So we have six stations now associated with the with the uh with the values that we're trying to impart. I won't talk about those, but one of the things that we emphasize upstairs is the great law of peace. And I hope, like I said, you can visit that wompum and condolence here in this corner, and then I want to touch on doctrine of discovery, European contact. So this is the Jesuit land grant from 1656. Uh, we had it translated. There's an image of it up here, and essentially it gives the company of Jesus or the Jesuits 600 square miles of Onondaga Nation territory even before they arrived. So, this is an example of how any discoverer entering the lands of non-Christian people, those lands are automatically deeded to the sponsoring nation, the church, and um as well as their bodies and all worldly possessions. There's lots more in here to talk about, but the the the Mashone have a wampum belt that tells a very different story of this contact between the Jesuits and um and uh the Andoga nation. This is called the Remembrance Belt. I won't read it because I don't have much time, but so there are quite starkly different accounts of that encounter from 1656. Columbus Circle, we know about that, and the doctrine of Christian discovery. So Columbus is representative of that. A succession of Catholic popes um justify slave trade and the conquest of the various parts of Africa initially and then the Americas, based on Christian, a kind of crusading notion of Christianity. So what I'm doing in my classes now is making the connection between this legacy, 1492, and Christian nationalism today. So it all is connected by um the uh Hurricanal in some ways. So this is a quote Jake was referring to from the versus 1452 when they're raiding West Africa, invade camp, capture, vanquish, and subsue, subdue all Saracens and pagans to reduce their persons to perpetual slavery and take away all their possessions and property. And then the Borgia Pope says something very similar in 1493, all justified by Christianity. That's what we're going back to. Sandy and I actually saw this document, the Cabot Charter, in the last few years. Okay, and that's all brought into U.S. property law in 1823, just before the opening of the canal. I wonder about that coincidence, Joe, um, and how those two things are connected. So John Marshall brings this doctrine of discovery language into US property law, and that continues today. So um, so um, you know, first-year law students will learn about the doctrine of discovery in their property law class. All right. And then, of course, Oneida v. Cheryl, which people should really talk about here. Um, and uh the first citation of the Cheryl case from 2005 is upholding, trying to uphold the doctrine of the stove in the face of Oneida attempts to re purchase their lands. All right. Now, over the last since 2009, there have been a number of repudiations of the doctrine of discovery, Christian groups, religious groups repudiating the doctrine of discovery. We're also working with those people, right? I can't get into that, but all right. Um I think I will skip over this meeting. All right, well, it's gonna play anyway. So, so um this would have been Onondaga Lake before it is um industrialized. So with Rachel May, you know, our current senator, we worked together on an NEH grant to to uh try to piece together what Onondaga Lake would have looked like previous to um industrialization in the 18th century, previous to the Erie Canal. So it was this kind of widely, wildly diverse uh territory um that that um people would have utilized in a variety of ways, right? Cedar swamp, um, all kinds of springs as well. And then of course the salt sheds from the 1860s, right? This would have been the uh the salt production uh right around where we have what's manifest destiny mall. There's uh there's uh uh yeah, that's Jake's one. Sorry, I stole that. Um but but uh but uh yeah, there it is there. This is a few years ago when we were just taking drone footage and then using it all. All right. So we talked about Sullivan Clinton campaign and how that becomes the uh the predecessor of the Erie Canal. So let me finish up with this slide. That we need to find a way, and I'll say this in a different way than Jake did, but we need to find a way that moves away from the colonizing stories of the Erie Canal uh from the doctrine of Christian discovery in order to embrace uh an indigenous story of our also of our creation as Americans that came out of this lake. And I hope that the Scano Center and um others that are involved in restorative healing, um, maybe that can be a consequence of bringing more attention to the history of the earth and I'll end it there. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:35:44

The producers of this podcast are intro and outro is this podcast is a good thing.