OT: White Bison Born Near Flagstaff

The White Buffalo are supposed to turn every color (white, yellow, red, brown, black) for every color of Man. Has anyone else heard that (?) because I forgot where I heard it. Also, the Mrs. said she read an African story about a White Elephant that was very similar to the White Buffalo story but I forget the details. As a side note I was in a shop in San Fransisco years ago called the White Buffalo Gallery, still have the shirt.

Frank
 
very nice. somehow knew Yvsa would be the first to respond. ;)
 
The following article appeared in a Madison weekly newspaper, Isthmus --
the Nov. 25 - Dec. 1 issue. I have attempted to transcribe it faithfully
herein, but there may be a few typos on my part. My apologies for taking
so long to get this on the 'net.

--Kim
sweeney@ssc.wisc.edu
Madison, Wisconsin
-----------------------------------------------------------------------


"It's a Miracle! A white buffalo, symbol of Native American rebirth and
world harmony, is born in Janesville."


by Tom Laskin


"To tell the truth, the first time I looked out there, I saw a million
dollars," says Janesville farmer Dave Heider as he watches Miracle, the
white buffalo calf held sacred by Native Americans, chew contentedly on
a mouthful of silage. "But once I saw how much this little calf means
to so many people, I couldn't see charging money for people to come and
look at her. I mean, how can you put a price on something that's sacred
and holy? You know, if God meant for me to be a millionaire, I would
have won the lottery."


Heider and his wife, Val, had been raising buffalo on their 46-acre
hobby farm for less than five years when Miracle was born snow white on
Aug. 20. Since then more than 20,000 people have come to see her, and
the gate to the Heider's pasture and the trees next to it are now covered
with offerings: feathers, necklaces and pieces of colorful cloth as well
as personal notes and the occasional medal won in Vietnam. All this has
piqued the interest of news and infotainment outlets around the world,
including the BBC, CBS News, and People magazine. Notes Dave Heider,
"We made the front page of papers seven days in a row when O.J. didn't."


Naturally, an assortment of wealthy collectors and modern-day Barnums
have also shown an interest in the calf. Early on, rock star Ted Nugent,
who penned a song about a white buffalo, offered to buy Miracle.


But the Heiders haven't tried to make money off the calf. Dave still
drives a truck for the county (he'll go up to a 16-hour day when the snow
begins to fall) and Val hasn't quit her janitor job. The couple has gotten
into a little merchandising, but profits from postcards and T-shirts sold
at the farm during weekend visiting hours go into a trust fund that will
be used to maintain the calf and pay for such other expenses as the 9,000-
volt electric fence that guards Miracle and the rest of the Heider's
13-buffalo herd. To prevent exploitation of the calf by carnival sharks
and what the Heiders' attorney, Dan Varline, calls "UFO magazines," both
Miracle's image and name have been copyrighted. (Isthmus had to sign an
agreement prohibiting broader use in order to photograph the calf.)


The Heiders knew from contacts in the bison industry that their calf
was unusual; in fact, the Wisconsin Farmer and The Beloit Daily News both
did stories about its birth. But it was only after the story got wider
distribution that they learned Miracle was held sacred by buffalo-hunting
Plains Indians; including the Lakota and the Cheyenne.


"The story hit the news wire on Wednesday and the first Native Americans
were here on Thursday," recalls Heider. "I think they were Oneida. They
came from Black River Falls. We were up by the calf with some people and
these Native Americans had been waiting for an hour, an hour and half. They
asked our permission to see the calf and also pray to it and leave an
offering."


News of the calf spread quickly through the Native American community
because its birth fulfilled a 2,000-year-old prophecy of northern Plains
Indians. Joseph Chasing Horse, traditional leader of the Lakota nation,
explains that 2,000 years ago a young woman who first appeared in the shape
of a white buffalo gave the Lakota's ancestors a sacred pipe and sacred
ceremonies and made them guardians of the Black Hills. Before leaving, she
also prophesized that one day she would return to purify the world, bringing
back spiritual balance and harmony; the birth of a white buffalo calf would
be a sign that here return was at hand.


Owen Mike, who's in line to succeed his 90-year-old father, Thomas, as
head of the Ho-Chunk (Winnebago) buffalo clan, says his people have a
slightly different interpretation of the white calf's significance. He adds,
however, that the Ho-Chunk version of the prophecy also stresses the return
of harmony, both in nature and among all peoples.


"It's more of a blessing from the Great Spirit," Mike explains. "It's
a sign. This white buffalo is showing us that everything is going to be
okay."


FULFILLING THE PROPHESY


Despite her enormous spiritual and cultural significance, Miracle isn't
scientifically important. UW-Madison geneticist Dr. Richard Spritz, an
expert in albinism and other pigmentation disorders, disputes news reports
that the odds of a white buffalo being born are less than one in 10 million.


"In humans, the frequency of albinism in most populations is about one in
15,000, which turns out to be a pretty handy number for buffalo because
the estimated number of them in the U.S. is something around 150,000. That
means, that any given time, if the frequency of albinism in buffalo is
similar to that in humans, there ought to be 10 white buffalo out there.
And if there's some other way to have a white buffalo, there ought to be
more."


So while the American Bison Association says the last documented white
buffalo died in 1959, Spritz says the person who alerted him to Miracle's
birth has tracked down six living white buffalo. He also notes that a
stuffed white buffalo has stood in Harvard's Peabody Museum for years.
(There's always some question whether a white buffalo is actually part
cow, and therefore a beefalo. Dave Heider says he will allow Miracle's
DNA to be examined in March, when it's time for her to be inoculated against
various diseases.)


But even if other white buffalo have been born in modern times, Miracle
holds special significance for Native Americans. She's female, and the bull
that sired her died, just as in the prophesy. And, while recent visitors
to the Heider farm are sometimes disappointed that the calf's head has
turned brown and its body is now a silvery tan, versions of the prophesy
state that the white buffalo calf would change colors four times, thus
signifying the colors of the four peoples she would unify: black, red,
yellow, and white.


Joseph Chasing Horse, in a phone interview from his home in Rapid City,
S.D., adds that winter counts -- which date the telling of the White
Buffalo Calf Woman story in sacred ceremonies -- confirm that this is the
buffalo calf of the prophesy.


Moreover, the birth of Miracle on the Heider farm coincides with increased
economic stability (thanks in large part to profits from Indian gaming) and
cultural rejuvenation among Native Americans. For example, the Ho-Chunk
(who this month received federal permission to restore their original name)
have used gaming profits to establish Ho-Chunk language programs in their
summer camp for teenage children and in four new Head Start centers. The
tribe has also reacquired a tract of land that includes sacred sites on the
lower Wisconsin River.


Larry Johns, a member of the Oneida tribe who works to preserve Indian
mounds and other sacred sites, stresses the cultural importance of such
recent discoveries as the Gottschall Rock Shelter in Iowa County, which
includes a rock painting from A.D. 900 that tells a story still told by
Ho-Chunk elders.


"My father and grandfather went to Indian schools, and they were
beaten for speaking their language," says Johns, who along with fellow
Oneida and representatives of other tribes has helped put together the new
Native American Council of Madison, a group dedicated to promoting cultural
awareness. "They tried to beat the Indian out of us. It's imperative that
we go back to these stories and find out what they mean to us...and we are."


And how does Miracle fit into all of this? Says Johns, "There's so
little understanding of Native American issues and ideas that any opportunity
to get people interested--even if it's just coming to see a white buffalo
calf--is a good thing."


Johns admits that seeing a key Indian prophesy fulfilled at a white
couple's farmette on the banks of the Rock River at first seemed a bit
bizarre. But the Heiders' eagerness to accommodate the people who came to
pray to the calf and leave offerings eased his mind.


"Initially I was wondering: Why in Janesville?" says Johns, who
rotates with other Indians in providing security for the calf during visiting
hours. "The place still has problems with the KKK. And, you know, it's
just not the friendliest of places. But now that I've gotten to know the
family, I understand why. Just about anybody else would be charging five,
10 bucks."


Dave Heider was impressed by the beauty of buffalo when he and Val
got their first good look at a bull a few years ago at an exotic animal
sale in Michigan. But the couple didn't get into buffalo farming because of
romantic visions of the Great Plains turned black by enormous bison herds.


"We got into it more or less for retirement," Dave explains. "Some-
thing to fall back on, a little extra income."


"And the meat's very low in cholesterol," adds Val, a buffalo booster
who echoes her husband's pragmatic take on buffalo farming. "You know, it's
the only animal that doesn't get cancer."


But the buffalo isn't just a food source for Native Americans. Especi-
ally for the Plains Indians, it has always been a living, breathing sacrament.
Unlike the soldiers and Wild Westerners who hunted North America's 60 million-
head herd to the brink of extinction in the 1890s, the Lakota and other Plains
Indians never wasted any portion of the buffalo they killed. The buffalo
provided them with food, shelter, clothing--all the essentials of life. It
was also a central part of their spiritual lives, and the hunt itself was a
ceremony.


These days, the Lakota and other nations have established their own
herds in South Dakota and elsewhere through the InterTribal Bison Association.
(The Ho-Chunk hope to raise a herd on part of the 600-acre parcel they've
purchased, with profits from their three casinos, on the lower Wisconsin
River.) And, along with renewed interest on the part of young people in their
native languages and sacred ways, the rebirth of the buffalo herds is strength-
ening cultural awareness.


But building herds is an ongoing process, and Joseph Chasing Horse says
much more must be done to protect the buffalo and their North American habitat:
"I would like to see something put into place where [the buffalo] would be
able to regenerate their herds and be given more of their aboriginal migrating
territory," he says. "Since the disappearance of the buffalo migration, we
have felt the ecological impact that it is having upon the land. With the
disappearance of the buffalo, there are certain medicines that no longer grow,
and the Great Plains are being turned back into a desert."


In recent years, non-Indians have also come to realize the profound
influence of buffalo on the health of the land. A South Dakota ranch manager
quoted in the National Geographic's recent cover story on the American
buffalo says wider migrations could help solve water-management problems
because the buffalo's sharp hooves break up the soil and improve its ability
to hold moisture.


Buffalo can live for nearly 40 years, which means the Heiders are
likely to form much stronger bonds with the Native Americans they've come to
know since August. And while the number of visitors who still trek to the
farm to see Miracle has decreased since the weather got cold and her winter
coat began to darken, Dr. Spritz and others say warmer weather may renew her
whiteness. That second miracle of coloration would undoubtedly bring a second
wave of attention to the calf and occasion more pilgrimages.


But no matter what happens to Miracle in the coming months and years,
Joseph Chasing Horse says this sign from the Great Spirit and the ensuing
age of harmony and balance it represents cannot be revoked. That doesn't
mean, of course, that the severe trials Native Americans have endured since
the arrival of Europeans on these shores are over. Indeed, the Lakota nation
mounted the longest court case in U.S. history in an unsuccessful effort to
regain control of the Black Hills, the sacred land on which the White Buffalo
Calf Woman appeared 2,000 years ago.


Still, despite their ongoing struggles, Native Americans are heartened
by the appearance of a white buffalo in Janesville, and have hope for a
harmonious and prosperous future.


"Mention that we are praying, many of the medicine people, the
spiritual leaders, the elders, are praying for the world," says Joseph Chasing
Horse. "We are praying that mankind does wake up and think about the future,
for we haven't just inherited this earth from our ancestors, but we are
borrowing it from our unborn children."


******************************


The farm is closed to visitors for the remainder of winter, but will reopen
this coming spring. To reach the farm, take I-90 south (from Madison) to
the Avalon exit (#177). Turn right at the top of the off-ramp. At the
fourth stop sign, take a right on South River Road. The farm is about a
quarter mile up the road, on the right-hand side.
 
Didn't read the article, but I remember you can have a white buffalo without it being albino. Which is good. Albino's don't last too long in the real world.
 
Thanks for taking time to post that Kismet. I really enjoyed reading it and wondered if the Buffalo was still around.
 
Let me second that thanks for putting up that story, Kismet.
 
There is an antique mall near my parent's place where there is a full head mount hanging on a wall in a corner of a White Buffalo. :( It's always kinda bothered me. I would like to think that no one has bought it because no one wants any part of such a crass end for such a magnificent creature.
 
MacHete said:
There is an antique mall near my parent's place where there is a full head mount hanging on a wall in a corner of a White Buffalo. :(
Click to expand...
Must be that the local ndns don't know it's there or if they do they can't afford to buy it. A White Buffalo head would be Big Medicine and revered among many ndns, even those who aren't involved in that aspect of ndn spirituality.
If it was nearby I can see a bunch of us raising the funds and rescueing it from the flea market.:D
 
Somehow this news story seems fitting here:

Apology to Indians advocated

By Andrew Mollison
COX NEWS SERVICE

WASHINGTON - An official apology for the way the United States and its citizens have mistreated American Indians and the country's other indigenous people is starting to move through Congress.

"I know there's potential for this being controversial," said the apology's author, Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan. He recalled the barrage of vitriolic phone calls a few years ago that blocked a similar attempt by former Rep. Tony Hall, D-Ohio, to obtain an official apology to the descendants of former slaves.

"But the circumstances are different," he said. "With the maturity of the sovereign tribes being acknowledged, the opening this fall (on Washington's Mall) of the museum recognizing the contribution of Native Americans, this is a moment that could be used, not to heal all old wounds, but to start building a new relationship."

The Senate this month passed, 92-0, a resolution saying it "joins with the president in expressing apology for the humiliation suffered by the prisoners in Iraq and their families."

But with that exception, Congress hasn't approved an official apology since 1993. That year, the House voted overwhelmingly and the Senate voted 65-34 to apologize to native Hawaiians on behalf of the United States for the overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaii 100 years previously.

The Senate Committee on Indian Affairs is expected to advance Brownback's bill to the Senate calendar in June. The co-sponsors include the panel's chairman, Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell, R-Colo., a member of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe who is the only American Indian in Congress, and its vice chairman, Sen. Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii.

The apology bill says the United States "acknowledges years of official depredations, ill-conceived policies, and the breaking of covenants by the United States Government regarding Indian tribes."

It also "apologizes on behalf of the people of the United States to all Native Peoples for the many instances of violence, maltreatment, and neglect inflicted on Native Peoples by citizens of the United States."

To show that the measure isn't a back-door attempt to settle ongoing legal disputes, it also says, "Nothing in this Joint Resolution authorizes any claim against the United States or serves as a settlement of any claim against the United States."

And the president is urged to join Congress in its apology.

"Canada has done it, but the United States has never formally apologized for all the atrocities and double-dealing," said Tex Hall, president of the 250-tribe National Congress of American Indians.

Hall, who is also chairman of the Mendan, Hidasa and Arikara Nation in Fort Berthold, N.D., said, "It's only one small step, but without an apology you can't do the healing, and without the healing, we can't come together as one country."

Others endorsing the resolution's broad thrust include leaders and tribal councils from more than three dozen Indian tribes and Alaskan Native communities, as well as the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America.

The apology "will not right the wrongs of the past but may correct misdirected policies of the present," wrote Anthony D. Johnson of Lapwai, Idaho, chairman of the Nez Perce Tribe.

Floyd Leonard, chief of the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma, said the resolution could help "tribal citizens as they struggle with overcoming the more than 500 years of mistreatment and disrespect that has resulted from the European invasion."

The official apology was described as "long overdue" by John Yellow Bird Steele, president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe in Pine Ridge, S.D.

Ron Walters, a University of Maryland political scientist who has tracked efforts to obtain reparations for descendants of slaves, said some blacks were bound to ask why they didn't get an apology as well.

"When President (Bill) Clinton went over to Africa and came close to an apology, Republicans took to the floor the next day and excoriated him," Walters recalled.

However, President Bush and his Democratic challenger, John Kerry, who both oppose reparations, might offer election-year support for apologies, Walters said.
 
Yvsa said:
Must be that the local ndns don't know it's there or if they do they can't afford to buy it. A White Buffalo head would be Big Medicine and revered among many ndns, even those who aren't involved in that aspect of ndn spirituality.
If it was nearby I can see a bunch of us raising the funds and rescueing it from the flea market.:D
Click to expand...

It seems to me the price tag was $6000. I haven't been there in over a year, but I'll check on it the next time I'm out that way.

The only local ndns around here are the Eastern variety. (India Indians) I think the closest population of any concentration is in Michigan, or maybe Tennessee. It seems there was extra careful effort expended in clearing them out of the Ohio valley. :rolleyes:
 
MacHete said:
It seems to me the price tag was $6000. I haven't been there in over a year, but I'll check on it the next time I'm out that way.
Click to expand...
Thanks Mac.:D At 6K it is priced way beyond what our little group could raise unless one of our benefactor's was feeling extra largesse.:(
It is in the reaches of a couple, three, Osages though.:D

The Osage are the richest ndns due to their oil funds. In the '20s the US Gubbiment actually sent in the FBI to investigate the "Ring of Terror" associated with the Osage people. The white and other non-ndn "caretakers" were decimating them something horrible!!!!:(
A favorite means of execution was a syringe full of morphine delievered under the arm in the armpit and then pour most of a bottle of whisky on and in them. Another drunk ndn bit the dust.:(
 
That is absolutely cold Bro. How do you make up for that kind of selfishness, inhumanity, and violation of trust? An apology?
 
there will always be mean people who hurt others....fact of life. :(
 
...but wrongdoers will still flourish. In the world stage of history, Every folk get thier chance as the peresecutors and the persecuted. How you say "sorry" is the indicator of lessons learned.

I once had the epiphany that the simple key to world peace is for everyone to say "I'm sorry" to everyone else, and mean it. If we could all do that, then we could move to the next level, true communication and understanding, mebbe even tolerance.

It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools, even in statecraft.

Keith
 
pendentive said:
there will always be mean people who hurt others....fact of life. :(
Click to expand...
So very true. Then there are those of us who will hurt the mean people in return. :grumpy:
 
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