My ancestors include Monahwee, who was one of the leaders in the Red Stick War, which was the largest Indian uprising in history, and Osceola, who refused to sign a treaty with the United States.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
My mother's family came from the British West Indies. And my father's family came from, well, my father's father came from the Montana/South Dakota area. They were Blackfoot Indian.
I'm a member of the American Indian Movement, and I'm from the indigenous nations of the Western Hemisphere.
My grandfather, Jesse Bowman, was of Abenaki Indian descent. He could barely read and write, but I remember him as one of the kindest people I ever knew. I followed him everywhere. He showed me how to walk quietly in the woods and how to fish.
The Indians began to be troublesome all around me, killing and wounding cattle, stealing horses, and threatening to attack us. I was obliged to make campaigns against them and punish them.
My father was the Formica King of Long Island, and my mother was the daughter of a Bengal Lancer in India.
I was the adoring son of a Welsh-Irish father, a dyed-in-the-wool Democrat, a Catholic Knight of Columbus who was a blue-collar, trade union organizer and, not surprisingly, a fervid Nixon-hater.
My mother was an activist; so was my father. They came from a generation of young Somalis who were actively involved in getting independence for Somalia in 1960.
There might well have been an Irish great-great-grandfather of mine back then in the 1800s.
I'm so American that I had grandfathers who actually fought a battle against each other.
It turns out one of my ancestors fought in the Continental Army, so I was inducted into the Sons of the American Revolution.