Nearly all that can be named or sold has at some point been named or sold using an Indian word or image. It’s a practice that started before the United States existed. Those images are worth a closer look. What if they are not trivial? What if they are instead symbols of great power? What if the stories they tell reveal a buried history—and a country forever fascinated, conflicted, and shaped by its relationship with American Indians? A digital interactive will offer background on items that use Indian words or imagery. A curator video introduces the ways that the creation of the Thanksgiving holiday reveals how Americans are trying to come to terms with difficult truths about the United States.

Pocahontas, a central figure in American history, is both celebrated and misunderstood. This section challenges the romanticized narrative of Pocahontas saving John Smith and acknowledges that the actual events likely differed from the legend. Her story is part of America’s story; this section addresses the idea of “So wrong, yet so right” and that the legends told are likely not the true events. Pocahontas lived just 22 years, left behind no recorded words, and sat for only one portrait. Yet, there are countless images of her, but each is a projection of another’s ideas. She became a rich, powerful woman and a key figure in the country’s founding. But, even more improbable for an Indigenous woman of the 1600s, she is in our heads today.

The Trail of Tears, often perceived as a tragic event solely associated with Andrew Jackson’s actions, is actually part of a broader narrative. American Indian Removal is presented as a significant national project that profoundly transformed the country. And the section illustrates how the country and its citizens continue to acknowledge and grapple with this dark chapter of our history. This section moves beyond what visitors who have heard of the Trail of Tears may think it is — a tragic thing that happened to Indians because of an evil man (Andrew Jackson). Instead, Americans positions Indian Removal as a vast national project that changed the country. This section delves into the complexities: how a nation founded on principles of liberty and equality grappled with the morality of displacing Native people from their ancestral lands. It further explores how removal was justified as a humanitarian act and executed with the full force of the federal bureaucracy.

Americans still grapple with the meaning of events like Little Bighorn as they come to terms with the complex history of the West. Not presented as a straightforward history lesson, this section immerses visitors in the national moment of 1876, a time when the United States was celebrating its 100th birthday but was also shocked by a defeat at the hands of Plains warriors. The central question posed is: “Why has the country so vividly remembered a lost battle for more than a century?”

Americans are deeply connected to Indians. These connections are with us from our earliest childhood and follow us throughout our lives. Why do they matter? One reason we are so entangled with Indians is that Indians seem to represent all that is most authentically American. They have been a constant in the country since before it began. They never go away. And yet over the centuries our feelings about Indians have been all over the place. The images of Indians everywhere are reminders. Americans aren’t quite ready to forget. We want to remember. We are still trying to make sense of a strange, complicated, and powerful history. Learn more about the exhibition from this conversation with the curatorial team!