Retired librarian shares about history of native Americans in Beloit area
RACHEL BRANDS Staff writer, Beloit Daily News Apr 13, 2023
BELOIT — Retired librarian Chris Nelson spoke about the native inhabitants of the Beloit area, their removal, and the subsequent challenges they faced before a packed room on Wednesday.
The presentation, titled “Ancestral Land: Native American History of the Beloit Area,” was part of the spring roster of classes offered by the Society for Learning Unlimited.
Nelson, a current member of the League of Women Voters, was tasked by the organization to give a presentation on land acknowledgment for one of their events. She used her skills and background as a retired reference librarian to accrue as much information about native Americans in Wisconsin as she could, and once the presentation was over, her interest in the topic remained.
“That whole (removal) narrative was very new to me,” said Nelson. “It was emotional for me to read firsthand accounts of the interactions and the government policies that allowed white settlers to take over.”
The “Ancestral Land” presentation had a lot to cover in just two hours, so Nelson focused on the basics, such as the villages full of early inhabitants and their removal after the Black Hawk War of 1832. She also delved into the specific challenges faced by indigenous people after the colonizations and included their stories.
A notable segment of the presentation focused on the living conditions of the Ho-Chunk people in the United States. Testimony during congressional hearings in July 1929 described the poverty, malnutrition, and other such poor conditions that the Ho-Chunk people were forced to endure.
“I don’t think you could see or find anywhere the extreme poverty and the extreme destitution that you find among the Wisconsin Winnebagoes,” said A.P. Jones of Black River Falls during an official testimony at the request of the Winnebago (later officially named Ho-Chunk) in 1929.
Another interesting portion of the presentation was the Ke-Chunk Ciporoke sculpture created by Ho-Chunk artist Truman Lowe shortly before his death in 2019. The idea originated from a group of Beloit College students who proposed the sculpture as part of a class project to create and pitch a plan for public art at the Confluence.
Professor of art history Jo Ortel, who created and taught the course where the project originated, was also a friend of Lowe’s and suggested he be involved in making the project a reality.
“I am interested in finding that point in time when history stops and myth begins,” said Lowe in the Ke-Chunk Ciporoke dedication brochure.