NATIVE AMERICAN HERITAGE TRAIL

This Trail exists to provide accurate information about the Indigenous people of the region, and to enable visitors to explore the Housatonic River Valley while viewing it through a Native American prism.

ABOUT

A program in partnership with the Stockbridge-Munsee Community, Band of Mohican Indians.

We encourage you to visit and learn about the places, landscapes, and resources that are related to Native American culture and history. We believe that this Native American Heritage Trail is an important contribution to public awareness and education. The contemporary descendants of the Indigenous people of the Housatonic Valley understand that the processes of colonialism removed their ancestors from their homelands and nearly obliterated their culture. Continuity was almost broken. This Program may contribute to “mending the hoop” by improving public understanding and appreciation of Native American culture – past, present, and future.

The Upper Housatonic Valley Native American Heritage Trail introduces visitors to the deep and vibrant histories of the region’s indigenous communities. A network of tribal representatives, diverse historical organizations, other cultural institutions and the local heritage area, provides multi-perspective views of regional histories. Through authentic, interpretive experiences the initiative shares stories, promotes open discussion, and erases long-held stereotypes so that visitors understand the native communities as living people with thriving cultures as well as rich past.

LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

It is with gratitude and humility that we acknowledge that we are learning, speaking and gathering on the ancestral homelands of the Mohican people, who are the indigenous peoples of this land. Despite tremendous hardship in being forced from here, today their community resides in Wisconsin and is known as the Stockbridge-Munsee Community. We pay honor and respect to their ancestors past and present as we commit to building a more inclusive and equitable space for all.

Housatonic Heritage advocates for informed research and respectful interpretation of the Indigenous People that have historically inhabited the lands of the Upper Housatonic River region. We urge others to join us in learning about these important histories, to understand the culture and lifeways of the Mohican Indians, and to respect both their true history and their contemporary lives.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

2021-03-15: We’re pleased to announce our 2021 Grant Program! Learn more about it here.