2019 Winter Newsletter

SEEKING THEIR ROOTS POTAWATOMIE INDIANS Two groups of visitors came to the Miami County Mu seum this month to seek information and identity with their ancestors who once lived in or passed through our county. The first group consisted of 43 individuals who were on a mission to retrace their ancestors who had been forced to travel from Indiana to Kansas in 1838 on what was later to be known as the Trail of Death. The group traveled from Indiana by caravan and arrived in Paola on Sept. 22nd. The original ancestors had been forced to walk over a period of two months to their new home in Miami County. Many died along the way and those who lived endured much hardship as they traveled in the late fall and the weather was not welcoming.

They stayed overnight in what was to become Paola and then went on the next day to a spot between present day Osawatomie and Lane. There they faced a very cruel winter with no good shelter or provisions. They then decided to leave the area for a new location further south on their reservation---Sugar Creek near present day Centerville, Ks. The 43 visitors were espe cially interested in the artifacts from that Sugar Creek Mission. The Potawatomie lived there for almost ten years and were served by the Catholic missionaries. In 1848 they abandoned the Sugar Creek Mission and moved to St. Mary’s Kansas to a new reservation to avoid the threat of Typhoid and other illnesses that was taking many lives at Sugar Creek. The caravan that reenacted the Trail of Death had members from many states of the mid-west. They have been repeating the route of the Trail of Death

every 5 years. Larry Lybarger.

Shirley Willard

Bob Pearl

Betty Bendorf

Betty Bendorf

Shirley Willard

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