Kickapoo and the "White Hair"

 

In 1984, between shaving off my beard and moving to Central America to regrow my beard and work on watershed management, I consulted with the Kickapoo Indians of northern Mexico who were to choose land for a reservation on the U.S. side of the border in Eagle Pass, Texas (as authorized by federal legislation). I visited them in Eagle Pass and also  visited briefly their ejido in Mexico. Later that summer I met with them and the Oklahoma Band of Kickapoo at a city park in Fort Lupton, Colorado near where members of both bands were working in agriculture. 

Top: Múzquiz Mexico, the Kickapoo ejido. 

Bottom: meeting in Fort Lupton Colorado.

The Fort Lupton meeting used three languages--most of us fluent in only two. For example: when I spoke I spoke in Spanish to the Mexican Kickapoo; they translated my words into Kickapoo for the Oklahomans who translated them into English for the Sioux lawyer and the Texas preacher who were also involved. The little "game of telephone" helped me and others know if our words were understood. It was a great meeting! 

I learned that in the Kickapoo-Kickapoo conversations I was called "White Hair".

They acquired their land, but I know little of its subsequent development and the ongoing welfare of the Kickapoo. I see they have a casino.

Satellite view of Kickapoo land in Eagle Pass, 2021

 

 

 

 

(c) from date of posting, by Bob Komives, Fort Collins