EPILOGUE.
This project has led me down a path which I
would not have expected when it started. My background is technology; not
history. My field of study is “information science” and after nearly forty
years’ experience, I question our fundamental understanding of knowledge and
wisdom. This area of study is known as epistemology and is concerned with how
we know what we think we know, especially with reference to its limits and
validity.
So how does reading old newspapers enhance
our understanding on the complexities of our post industrial information age?
First you have to understand that since Claude Shannon first rigorously stated
the theoretical basis of “Information Theory,” we as a society have gotten a
pretty good handle on it. What we don't understand from a mathematical,
analytical, units of measure basis is Knowledge or Wisdom.
Your computer does not “know” much of
anything except what you tell it. A computer accepts, on faith, your statement
of what a starting bank balance is. You accept its analysis of the ending
balance, but the answer is fundamentally dependent on the accuracy of your
input: the beginning balance. Neither can your computer tell you how to spend
the money in your account "wisely.” A computer doesn't know anything about
"Wisdom.” We know "Wisdom" when we see it, but we can't
quantitatively define and measure it. We can't calculate our "Gross
National Wisdom.” In fact, most of us would think it silly to try.
The process used by many Indians is
illustrated in events taking place in Texas in 1840 when the Comanches used the
logic: “If the white man considers our hostages valuable, then let’s take in
one and see what his level of value is.” To the Indian it was a matter of a
simple trade. To the white man it was considered as treachery inasmuch as the
Chief lied: “We have brought in the only one we had; the others are with other
tribes.” The swift action by the Texans in the fight that followed, wherein
thirty Comanche chiefs and warriors, three women, and two children were killed,
triggered a full generation of enmity. This tragedy was played out as a
morality play. Each moral outrage by alternating sides produced an amplified
moral response by the other.
The long depression of 1873-1878
grew out of extensive investments by Americans and foreigners in new
transcontinental railroads and was precipitated by the failure of Jay Cooke and
Son, bankers of the Northern Pacific road, who went down partly because of the
diminished buying from France and England following the disastrous outcome of
the Franco-Prussian War. For five years the annual crop of business failures
increased each year. No doubt the wavering financial policy of the government,
hesitating between inflation and resumption of specie payments, helped prolong
the bad times. Decision at last to resume and a favorable crop situation in
1878 were followed by recovery.
The Treaty of Medicine Lodge in 1867
enticed the Comanche, Kiowa, Kiowa-Apache, Arapaho, and Cheyenne Indians to go
to a reservation with promises of adequate food.
As a result of the 1873-78 panic,
government allowances for Indian foodstuffs were insufficient and a portion of
their supplies withheld. In the summer of 1874 the Comanche, Kiowa, and
Cheyenne rebelled, deeming it necessary to leave their reservations in search
of their food supply: the buffalo. Large bands began to depredate on the
frontiers of Kansas, Colorado, and Texas.
It is ironic that the government of the
United States could not keep the miners out of the Black Hills because they
were acting as free men, and thus could not be controlled. Yet when the Indians
acted as free men and killed them for trespassing and violating the treaty of
their government, the Indians were made to submit to control by incarceration
on a reservation. It is frequently stated in the newspapers that the Indians
must be controlled. Nowhere did anyone suggest that white men be controlled.
Control was the linchpin of Indian policy
by U. S. Indian Agent McLaughlin at Standing Rock Agency. By withholding food
and housing sustenance, the agent was able to force the Indians to submit to
his will. Once when Sitting Bull came back from a theatrical tour with Bill
Cody, he had a lot of cash. According to Sioux custom, he distributed his
assets among the poorest and most needy of the tribe. The Sioux agent went
ballistic! How could he "control" the savages if his power was
subverted by this interloper? This must be stopped! The agent’s power was
clearly based on his ability to withhold.
"Show Indians" were an anomaly
which has never been thoroughly examined. The Sioux agent considered them
subversive. Yet it is they who preserved the Indian culture and tradi-tions.
Indian concepts of personal honor and justice evolved with "Show
Indians".
The American Boy Scout movement was founded
on these values and principles.
Bison Films, a business
run by the Miller brothers on the 101 Ranch near Ponca City made over 50 early
movies that can be classified as "Cowboys and Indians.” Today these films
exist only as a rather inaccurate list of titles. But the moral behavior
conveyed by this body of work became the
"Code of the West," which was eventually written down and used by
cowboys such as Gene Autry and Indians such as Will Rogers. Recently, it has
been proposed by a political analyst that the American public use this code to
judge behavior of their politicians rather than any code of law.
“Show Indians” carried their code of honor
and conveyed it to the movie cowboys. In the early 1920s. A policy was
inaugurated by movie makers: native Americans could not play the parts of
Indians in the movies. One of the first group of actors who took over these
parts was Francis Ford Copolla. He learned the code and taught it to his son,
who expressed it cinematically in his movie, "Apocalypse Now.” Helping on
that film was one of Francis Ford Copolla's student helpers from U.C.L.A. , a
kid named George Lucas. George Lucas, with help from his mentor, Joseph
Campbell, projected the "Code of the West" into the future with his
"Star Wars" series of movies.
So who learned from whom? What is the moral
basis of our society today? How could a civilized man approaching the year
2,000 use the moral code of an Indian society, which believed that the ultimate
act of freedom is to die? How can an act of savagery express moral outrage?
Dare we ask Theodore Kaczynski or Timothy McVeigh.
One of the stories that stuck in my memory
was Caddo George who said in reply to a white man accused the Indian of
cheating, "You cheat me someday". The Indians learned about
civilization from us. What did we learn about honor and loyalty and savagery
from them?
Bill
Bottorff
Austin,
Texas.
BILL: MUCH OF YOUR EPILOGUE COVERS ITEMS
NOT CONTAINED IN THIS VOLUME. DOES THAT MATTER? I CHANGED THE COMANCHE 1840
KILLING TO FIT MORE WITH STORY WE TOLD. I ADDED THE KILLING OF SITTING BULL IN
BOOK. WE DID NOT COVER MUCH ABOUT “SHOW INDIANS” AS SUCH. I AM VERY CONFUSED
OVER SOME OF THE THINGS YOU BRING UP SINCE THEY WERE NOT COVERED IN BOOK, BUT
MAYBE THAT IS THE REASON YOU BROUGHT THEM UP HERE. DO YOU HAVE THE SPELLING
CORRECT FOR COPOLLA? FEEL THAT SOME OF THE ITEMS YOU COVERED ARE TOO FAR
REMOVED FROM THE ERA BOOK COVERS. YOU ARE SKIPPING TOO FAR AHEAD IN TIME. ONCE
THE MILLERS ARE COVERED, THEN SOME OF YOUR ITEMS MAKE SENSE TO ME. MAW