NATIVE AMERICAN PROGRAM PRESENTED TO SOCIETY

Ron Wemigwase, of the US Forest Service office in Elkins, presented a most interesting program to the June meeting of the ARFHS. Mr. Wamigwase, an Ottawa Indian from Michigan, provided the membership with much information from his experiences in Native American Genealogy which should be helpful to those with Native American roots who wish to find out more about their families.

Mr. Wamigwase spoke to the membership about pitfalls in researching Native American roots, which he says are often the same as those faced by others interested in genealogy. Mr. Wamigwase's ancestors, for instance, named "Assinaway", had their name changed to "Andrews" at the time of the census, a fate which is familiar to descendants of many European immigrants. In addition to such pitfalls as this, Mr. Wamigwase points out that the Native American is the only ethnic group in America faced with the burden of "proving" that they belong to an ethnic group.

The name of the Ottawa nation is often mis-pronounced and should sound like "o-DAW-a". Wamigwase and his ancestors belong to the "Great Traverse Bay bands" and the "Little Traverse Bay bands", which are divisions made by Caucasian administrators rather than by the tribe themselves.

Mr. Wamigwase has traced his own family back to the mid 1700s, but spoke of a friend who used records in Europe generated by Catholic Missionaries to trace his own Native American heritage back to the 1300s. Ron mentioned School records kept by Jesuits, and a 9000 name Indian Census as among the sources he used to document the identities of his ancestors. His ancestor Catherine Wemigwance was proven by the census to be a Native American even though some had thought that she was not. Mr. Wamigwase presented the following pedigree as part of the program:

Wamigwase Pedigree

The Allegheny Regional Family History Society
Post Office Box 1804
Elkins, West Virginia, 26241

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