Just got home from a Western trip. Mainly to visit family in CO, but we made a few side trips along the way. Here is looking out over the Green River valley, near Pinedale, WY. This was the site of 6 of the original rendezvous in the 1830s. Really neat to be in all the places I have been reading about.

As I’m getting older, I am more and more interested in our Native Americans. I’ve never even met one…

And here is Bent's Old Fort near LaJunta, CO. Very prominent in the southern buffalo trade.

Thanks for sharing.

You stop in to the mountain man museum there in Pinedale?It was awesome.I got a 6x6 mule deer and an 7x7 elk in that area about 10 years ago.

Looks like a nice trip.

I'm going to plan a trip in the next year or two to ser a lot of the west with the family. Figured 2 weeks min maybe up to a month. Want to do it most likely when my daughter finishes school before she starts working, now the boys are old enough they will also be able to do everything and remember it should be nice. Hopefully it works out.

Bruce, we hit the Cody Center in Cody, the Museum of the Mountain Man in Pinedale, Bent's Fort in LaJunta and the Museum of the Fur Trade in Chadron, NE.

PF, plan for lots of time. The West has so much to see.

I'm surprised you haven't met 1 of the million plus Americans who mostly falsely claim to be Cherokees.

I've met probably a couple of hundred "Native Americans" who will quickly tell you they are, so you don't confuse them with the white or black people, who they really are. I don't believe having a few percent Native American DNA makes you a Native American. 2 of my best friends in college got scholarships for being Native American. They were brothers with curly blonde hair, blue eyes, male pattern baldness and pale white skin. They couldn't even develop a tan in the Summer. They just got sunburned.

2% of my DNA comes from Anatolia and the Caucus, yet I don't tell everyone I meet that I am Anatolian. Many people like Elizabeth Warren, make their living Live Action Role Playing being Native American. She tested 1/1068th of a percent Native American, which is well below the margin of error for DNA tests.

Most "Native Americans" really aren't. For most it's just a well used scam to get special privileges and attention.

Keith

Very nice.

This

Sure you have. They just didn't tell you. You only need to be 1/32nd native to get a BIA card or a tribal ID. Likely there are thousands in this country who aren't aware they are legally native americans..

[/quote]

I just got back from a 4 day back packing trip in the wind rivers. We also stopped at the Museum of the Mountain Man in Pinedale, and that was pretty neat.

Nice trip ...K Snow

I think "The Raven" will be mad that birds are not welcome.....Beware............................................................

I live right next to the Seneca Reservation in Western NY. Went to school with and am life long friends with more Native Americans than I can count. Not once has one introduced themselves as such. They certainly wouldn't be confused with white or black people. Native Americans might be rare out your way but not around NY.

I played Lacrosse on the Mohawk Akwasasnee [where the partridge drums] land .. Made a lot of friends

It depends where you are, stopped at a native gas station in northern new york,didn't even realize we strayed into the rez there. Guys were pale, probably mostly French, the rez's here on the island, their residents came from the dark continent, most of them can't spell Indian much less be even a remote mix...but that doesn't stop them for milking the gravy train, lol, works out cause their gas is 40 plus cents cheaper than anywhere else.

Most of them seem ok one on one, like most folks

Trapping the south Platte river made me think about the first white men to trap it. Back a few generations one of my great grandfathers, direct line same last name, was trapping and hunting buffalo around Bents fort. Moved there from N. Carolina.

Thats great family history Danny. I would love to get out there and trap some day, in those same waters as the original trappers.