Muscogee (Creek) Nation takes part in Native American Day Festivities

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Oct. 10, 2017

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Muscogee (Creek) Nation takes part in Native American Day Festivities

by: Amanda Rutland/MCNPR

TULSA, Okla. — The Muscogee (Creek) Nation, along with the Cherokee and Osage Nations, participated in the Native American Day celebration Oct. 9, hosted by the Greater Tulsa Area Indian Affairs Commission (GTAIAC) on the Guthrie Green in Tulsa.

Tulsa is the first major city in Oklahoma to replace Columbus Day with Native American Day.

“There has been a movement around the country. Many of our great cities adopted Indigenous Peoples Day or Native American Day and, here in Oklahoma home to 39 tribes, it is time our major cities recognize the accomplishments and contributions of our Native peoples,” GTAIAC Commissioner Jim Pepper Henry said.

Tulsa Mayor GT Bynum spoke at the event.

“As we work to build this city up in the 21 Century to make it the world-class city that we believe it is. We recognize the contributions of the Native American community to make it that. We recognize that this is, in the whole world, one of the foremost cities that has been shaped and influenced by Native Americans,” Bynum said.

Modern day Tulsa overlaps the territories of the Muscogee (Creek), Cherokee and Osage Nations, with 70 percent being in the Muscogee (Creek) jurisdiction.

MCN Principal Chief James R. Floyd thanked the mayor and city council putting Native American Day as a priority.

“This recognition comes at a time when we the Muscogee people recall our first arrival here in 1836. October is when we remember our forced relocation from our Homelands in Alabama and Georgia and settlement in what is known as Council Oak Park at 18^th and Cheyenne,” Floyd said.

The celebration included exhibition and social dancing with singing by different tribes.