Saturday, March 3, 2012

Our Native American Immigrant Roots 1

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oglala_Lakota 

Sylvia Mitchell Lynch bore and raised her children Bernard, Rose Iva, and Patricia Ann in Lily, South Dakota. Their father Leo Louis Lynch came from German and Irish stock. 

Sylvia was born in 1905, of the same stock. Nothing surprising about that. The great German and Irish immigrations occurred during the 19th century. Sylvia fell in love with Leo Lynch when she was 14. Oglala Lakota Sioux blood ran through her veins as well, with some French thrown in for spice. I am not surprised, remembering Grandma. Lily is smack dab in the middle of ancient Sioux land, so no surprises there either. 

Sylvia's father Emerson Mitchell was half Oglala Lakota Sioux. A handsome man with a sunny personality, Emerson delighted in playing the fiddle on the front porch of the farmhouse during parties he dreamed up. My mother Rose said that "everyone loved Pa." Sylvia, my grandmother, did not play the fiddle but she played a sweet harmonica.

Many terrible events devastated the Sioux, and yet they remain. We come from them. It's easy to learn more about the Sioux. The two most important books in their 20th Century history are Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee and In the Spirit of Crazy Horse. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, by Dee Brown, was made into a movie

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