{"id":37911,"date":"2022-10-11T03:16:02","date_gmt":"2022-10-11T09:16:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/native-pride-shines-in-durango\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T02:41:00","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T08:41:00","slug":"native-pride-shines-in-durango","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/native-pride-shines-in-durango\/","title":{"rendered":"Native pride shines in Durango"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Participants
Participants of the Indigenous Peoples Day celebration march down Main Avenue to call attention to a host of issues facing Native peoples. (Garret Jaros\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Native American students at Fort Lewis College gathered Monday for a potluck lunch punctuated by traditional Native dishes during a day filled with events on campus to honor and celebrate Indigenous peoples.<\/p>\n

Many of the students wore traditional attire that danced with color and texture \u2013 shining bright with Native pride.<\/p>\n

Shasta Hampton, the student engagement coordinator for the Native American Center at FLC, welcomed the students in her native Apache language before getting in line to ladle elk stew her brother harvested from their White Mountain Apache reservation in Arizona.<\/p>\n

\"Shasta
Shasta Hampton helps dish up traditional dishes Monday at the Native American Center at Fort Lewis College during a day of events on campus celebrating Indigenous Peoples Day. (Garret Jaros\/Durang Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cLast year, our theme was honoring the children that never made it home,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd that really touched a lot of people because it was about residential boarding school children. And then this year, we wanted to heal from those impacts and that trauma, and I feel like part of healing is celebrating who we are as Indigenous people.\u201d<\/p>\n

With the official theme of \u201cHealing Our Communities,\u201d students, faculty and staff members were encouraged to \u201ccelebrate, honor and recognize our Indigenous people and their culture(s), resiliency, and contributions to the Americas.\u201d<\/p>\n

Campus events hosted by the Native American Center began at 8:30 a.m. with poster making; followed by a solidarity walk; the Indigenous food circle (potluck); earring making honoring missing and murdered Indigenous relatives; pottery making; Native Olympic games \u2013 hosted by Native American business leaders; then a short dinner break followed by a dance featuring hoop dancing.<\/p>\n

\u201cHealing comes in many ways,\u201d Hampton said. \u201cLike creating community through food, through ceremonies, or just being here at school \u2013 finding those ways to heal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hampton\u2019s homemade wozapi, a puddinglike dish she made with wild blueberries, spread plenty of healing goodness to the crowd that gathered.<\/p>\n

Hampton estimates that Native students at FLC account for 46% to 48% of the student population, representing about 175 tribes.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like everyone is moving in a good space right now,\u201d she said. \u201cJust acknowledging Indigenous Peoples Day, and realizing that Indigenous people are here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Student Sage Walstrom of the Navajo Nation agreed that progress was being made.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think this day is a part of rewriting and taking over the narrative of U.S. history from the less dominate perspective. It\u2019s a start,\u201d Walstrom said.<\/p>\n

When Walstrom, a junior studying environmental conservation with a food system certificate was in grade school, they were taught to honor Columbus.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was just so ingrained in our systems, and school systems, to teach this false history,\u201d Walstrom said. \u201cNow that I\u2019m older and less conditioned, I think how absurd that there would be a Columbus Day at all, and how it seems only right that it is Indigenous Peoples Day. Kids now won\u2019t be in school celebrating this glorious man. Instead, they will be celebrating their own peoples.\u201d<\/p>\n

Durango, which sits on the ancestral land of the Ute people, who were forcibly removed by the U.S. government in 1881, acknowledged Indigenous Peoples Day on Jan. 5, 2016, with a document signed by City Council and the mayor. The day is celebrated on the second Monday in October.<\/p>\n

President Joe Biden became the first U.S. president to formally recognize the holiday by signing a proclamation Oct. 8, 2021, declaring Indigenous Peoples Day to be a nationally holiday.<\/p>\n

Despite many cities and municipalities across Colorado and the country recognizing the holiday, only 10 states officially celebrate the day \u2013 Alabama, Alaska, Hawaii, Maine, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota and Vermont.<\/p>\n

An Indigenous Peoples Day celebration at Buckley Park, which ran from 4 to 8 p.m., began with sign making while Native drums and singing played over a sound system, followed by a march down Main Avenue, with a stop to protest in the shadow of \u201cThe Chief\u201d sign, a cartoonish caricature in the heart of downtown.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not Leaving!\u201d the marchers shouted as they gathered on the sidewalk below the sign and across the street from Toh-Atin Gallery, which owns the sign. \u201cTake it down! Take it Down! Take it Down!\u201d<\/p>\n

The gallery is a purveyor of Native American artwork. The owners have refused calls to remove the sign, saying it is a part of Durango history. Attendees of the Indigenous Peoples Day march called it outdated and blatantly racist.<\/p>\n

Other chants along the Main Avenue march included \u201cWe are here! White silence is violence! Land Back!\u201d and \u201cStand up and fight back!\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\u201cMurder
\u201cMurder is the third leading cause of death for Native women age 10-25,\u201d reads the sign in front of a red dress at the Indigenous Peoples Day gathering at Buckley Park in Durango on Monday. (Garret Jaros\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The Indigenous People\u2019s park gathering was organized by Four Cornerless Borders, said one of the organizers who declined to give her name.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you know how racist this town is?\u201d she said. \u201cThat\u2019s why I don\u2019t give my name. The city put up a Columbus Day post on their Facebook page this morning. Only outrage on social media got it removed. The city of Durango needs to pay attention to what they just did.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another in attendance at the park gathering, who also declined to give his name, but identified as a member of the Dene, said he wanted to see an end to colonialism.<\/p>\n

\u201cSettler colonialism remains pervasive and so many people out there don\u2019t admit or even acknowledge it,\u201d he said. \u201cI want to see it and border-town systems predicated on Indigenous displacement, violence and genocide abolished.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Denae
Denae Stucka-Benally would like to see people educate themselves about Native peoples. (Garret Jaros\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Denae Stucka-Benally, who is Navajo and a starting player for the international Indigenous roller derby team, said celebrating Indigenous Peoples Day is really important.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like people don\u2019t realize we are still here,\u201d she said. \u201cYou learn in school that this is who they were and you know, we are still here. We are still alive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stucka-Benally\u2019s mother was taken from her home as a child and raised by white Mormons under the Indian Placement Program, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo that wasn\u2019t so long ago,\u201d she said. \u201cSo I guess education. A lot of people don\u2019t realize we are still here and I feel like even when it comes to stolen land, there\u2019s so much real estate that a lot of Native people can\u2019t afford, especially here in Durango. That\u2019s one of the big things, to get our land back. Recognize that this was our land, and let Native people get more involved in those kinds of decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n

gjaros@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Indigenous Peoples Day celebrated in community once located on Ute tribal land<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37912,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[132,28,1097,561,598],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-37911","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-fort-lewis-college","tag-headlines","tag-indigenous-people","tag-native-american","tag-public-holiday"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37911","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37911"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37911\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83831,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37911\/revisions\/83831"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37911"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37911"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37911"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=37911"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}