Wednesday, September 22, 2004
About 80,000 people attended the grand-opening ceremonies.
LOS ANGELES TIMES
WASHINGTON -- The Indian tribes who inhabited the Americas when Christopher Columbus arrived more than 500 years ago reclaimed a piece of the nation's capital as their own Tuesday.
As ceremonial drums beat, sage leaves burned and bells clanked from suede boots, 25,000 Indians from North, Central and South America marched in a procession from the Smithsonian Institution's Castle -- the oldest building on the national Mall -- to dedicate the newest.
At 1:35 p.m., W. Richard West Jr., a Southern Cheyenne and Stanford University Law School graduate who wore a majestic feather headdress, walked across the threshold to officially open the National Museum of the American Indian that he has directed since it was founded in 1990.
The museum, the 18th facility under the Smithsonian's cultural umbrella, offers a measure of reconciliation. A sense of justice reclaimed was a prevalent theme of the day's grand-opening ceremonies, attended by 80,000.
"To those within sight and sound of this occasion who descend from those who came, 'Welcome to Native America,'" West said, noting that he had given years of thought to the dedication of the museum.
"And I say to those who descend from native ancestors who were here, 'Welcome home.'"
Reconciliation
The $219 million museum, with its undulating limestone exterior meant to resemble the permanence of a building weathered by years of history, also promises to be a unique addition to the Mall -- blending the legacy of grievance over land lost, treaties abrogated and Indians killed with the vibrancy of a current population enjoying an economic renaissance.
In recent years American Indians have seen an economic resurgence -- not only from casino gambling profits, but from new businesses as well.
Although the government sector remains the largest employer within Indian communities, small businesses have seen a nearly 100 percent growth, generating much of the new job gains, according to a recent study by the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development.
Despite the day's celebratory tone, the museum is not without its critics, concerned that the exhibit whitewashes the violent clashes between European settlers and indigenous tribes and downplays the deaths of millions of Indians from disease and war.
Holocaust remembered
One group called on Congress to rename the site the National Holocaust Museum of the American Indian.
But the history was not lost on the event's speakers, including President Alejandro Toledo, Peru's first popularly elected indigenous leader. Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell, R-Colo., the only American Indians in the Senate, said the mass slaughter of Indians made them "America's first endangered species."
West said the museum does not skirt its history, but also seeks to reconcile the Indian place in modern-day American society.
"Today Native America takes its rightful place in the national Mall in the very shadow of the Capitol itself," he said.