What impressed me when I arrived from Florida in the 1970s was to discover that William Penn once lived in Falls Township. Growing up, I only knew Willie as the guy on the Quaker Oats container in Mom’s kitchen. But here I was suddenly covering Falls for the Bucks County Courier Times newspaper as a rookie reporter.

My pace included Pennsbury Manor, the rebuilt estate of William who founded Pennsylvania in 1682. What was curious to me was its unusual connection to the Lenni Lenape Native American tribe. It has ruled the Delaware River estuary for millennia, perhaps as far back as when mastodons roamed the earth.

Although the English King Charlie II ceded Pennsylvania to William, he decided to negotiate with the Indians for a fair purchase. The natives respected Penn and were frequently partied at his mansion. However, the Lenape were not treated fairly by Penn’s sons after his death. They stripped the Lenape of their lands all along the Pennsylvania side of Delaware as far north as Port Jervis, New York. Inevitably, the Indians were expelled and pushed west into Oklahoma, Wisconsin and Canada today.

The purge was so total that when cemeteries were unearthed years later, bodies and burial artifacts were sold or donated to various museums and individuals across the country. Adding to this sad history, Pennsylvania as a state refuses to recognize the Lenape or any other tribe. It’s strange to me; in my native California, 109+ tribes are recognized. Florida recognizes the Seminole and Miccosukee tribes. Here? None.

Lenape continues to seek recognition in his home country. Meanwhile, last month they repatriated to Pennsbury Manor the bodies of 180 ancestors and nearly 10,000 burial artifacts removed years ago from archaeological digs in western New Jersey over the past two centuries.

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In 2004, Lenape leaders were visiting the State Museum of New Jersey in Trenton to take custody of the ancestral remains with the intention of burying them in Lenape home territory. But where? They turned to Douglas Miller, Director of Education at Pennsbury Manor. “They came up with the idea of ​​creating an ancestral cemetery at the Manor,” Doug told me. “Pennsbury was honored to have the Delawares return home and entrust us with the task of helping their ancestors find peace.”

In Delaware Native American lore, members of the tribe are to rest near where they once lived so they can find their way into the spirit world. When disturbed, so is the mind. Tribes across the United States are engaged in the search for exhumed bodies to bring them back as close as possible to where they once lived.

The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act passed by Congress in 1990 gave impetus to hundreds of tribes across the United States. Think of it this way, according to Delaware Indian Tribal Chief Brad KillsCrow: Led an all-Indian archaeological team at Arlington National Cemetery because I wanted to study the life of a great Indian War hero. independence ? »

In 2012, Doug and former Manor educator Mary Ellyn Kunz traveled to Oklahoma to meet Delawares in Bartlesville and Anadarko. By then, the search for the bodies was well advanced. Archaeological records from 19th- and 20th-century digs in western New Jersey led tribesmen to where bodies and other artifacts ended up – State Museums of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, University from Harvard, University of Pennsylvania, University of California at Berkeley and many more. All cooperated for the reburial in April in the new cemetery marked with Lenape flags flying above.

About 80 Delawares and 50 guests attended the five-day reburial. They included the five chiefs of the Delaware nations. They did not request any media coverage for what they considered a private family funeral.

“As we watched the placement of the ancestors from a distance, we could smell the cedar from a manure pot and hear the songs in their native language,” Doug recalls. “Mary Ellyn looked at me with tears in her eyes to point out that the songs hadn’t been heard here since the 18th century.” It was the first gathering of the Lenape tribe at Penn Mansion in over 250 years.

After the burials, Pennsbury Manor held a ceremonial feast. The deed signed by Chief Lenape Tamanend at Gray Rock in Morrisville which conveyed all Lower Bucks to William Penn in exchange for various items deemed valuable to the Indians was on display. The Wampum Lenape Friendship Belt given to Penn to cement a close bond also caught the eye. The Penn family in England donated it to the Philadelphia Museum of Art who loaned it to the mansion for the repatriation gathering. A descendant of Lenape wept at the sight of her.

Said Doug of the tribe, “Their sense of community, respect for elders, their ancestry and their traditions is truly remarkable.”

Sources include “Native Americans Push for Reburial of Ancestors, Return of Cultural Artifacts” by Celina Tebor published July 31, 2021 in the Los Angeles Times; “Lenape Ancestors and Ceremonial Objects Finally Returned” by Jenna Kunze published April 21 in Native News Online.

Carl LaVO can be contacted at [email protected]