I have been watching the Netflix reboot of Little House on the Prairie, and I came to a disturbing conclusion. The settlers arrive in the Kansas territory, which is the Osage Indians land. The government had promised land to the settlers on Osage territorial land.
While this is a fictional account, it still left me with an uncomfortable feeling about how Western Expansion unfolded. I have never entered a family’s home uninvited. My father stressed throughout my childhood to be considerate of others.
I couldn’t have been a settler who barged onto another people’s land. As an Osage, I would have seen the settlers as stealing my food and land. I put myself in their framework. I would strongly object to people “settling” on my lawn and helping themselves to the food in my house.
In reality, that is what happened throughout the Western Expansion. What is done is done, but I have guilty feelings that this revelation came to me so late in my life. As a child reading about the Western Expansion, I did not realize how rude the people moving West were. While wholly unfair, it is another example of “might makes right.”
Published by Editor, Sammy Campbell.