Opinion
Opinion: Tribes get ready for their day in spotlight


"The word Potomac means "where the goods are brought in" and it dates from the local Indian tribe rudely displaced here centuries ago by colonial whites intent on a New World. The word seems perfect for the whiff of irony and history in the air this month as the last of 800,000 Indian artifacts � priceless goods, in fact � were trucked in from New York City to become the bedrock treasure of the new National Museum of the American Indian.

Even incomplete, the museum stands as a modernistic cynosure, defiantly staring down its immediate neighbor, the gleaming white Capitol, where so many treaty promises to American Indians were written and broken. The museum marks a grand turning point in that history, a sacred federal site ceded to Indian management and broadcasting a message of hardy survival, not tribal extinction, to throngs of tourists."

Get the Story:
Francis X. Cline: The American Tribes Prepare Their National Showcase (The New York Times 3/28)
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Relevant Links:
National Museum of the American Indian - http://www.nmai.si.edu

Related Stories:
NMAI: From saving Indians to honoring them (03/18)