What it means to be ‘Wichita’ and ‘Kanza’ in the state’s largest city
Today, July 21, Wichita turns 150 years old.
So many times, in the past when we’ve reflected on Wichita’s history, the story lines have often been devoted to the town’s early developers and founders — J.R. Mead, Darius Munger and William Greiffenstein.
“They started with the belief that Wichita would become a big city,” said cowboy historian Jim Gray. “A lot of towns do that, but how many really have the expertise and knowledge to do it?”
Wichita did it, he said, because “it had a team of men.”
But it also had other people, other stories in its past, that don’t get told as often.
“Certainly, there have been people who are not as loud, working behind the scenes making things happen,” said Jami Frazier Tracy, curator of collections at Wichita-Sedgwick County Historical Museum.
In the fabric of Wichita are the diverse voices of a city. And, in the very roots of Wichita, are the people whose heritage literally mean Wichita and Kansas and whose ancestors were here long before any of the rest of us.
Go anywhere in Wichita and there are nods to the city’s Native American past – Blackbear Bosin’s “Keeper of the Plains,” the Mid-American All-Indian Center, 13th Street’s Minisa Bridge.
How we earned our names
In the mid-1860s, names were tossed back and forth, as early occupants debated what to call the small village sprouting along the banks of the Arkansas River.
A quick warning to readers: It was in the days before political correctness.
John Barnum, a Civil War veteran, plainsman and scout who was living in the area at the time suggested the growing community be called “Opi Ela.”
“What I really had in mind was naming the town for the handsomest squaw I ever saw,” Barnum admitted in a Wichita Eagle article on June 13, 1926. “She was the daughter of the Wichita chief, and her name was Opi Ela, which means Elk’s Tooth, but the name was too much for us.
“So, the early leaders named the town after her tribe, the Wichitas.”
Wichita
It was J.R. Mead who made the final decision to name Wichita after the American Indian tribe that camped along the banks of the Arkansas River during the mid-1860s between what is now Murdock and 13th street. The 1,500 Wichitas and members of affiliated tribes were brought to the area under the supervision of Jesse Chisholm to escape harassment from Confederate troops. The Wichita sympathized with the Union and these particular Wichitas were refugees of the federal government.
Their time along the banks of the Arkansas, was limited.
Still, they were the ancient residents of Kansas. The ancestors of the Wichita were the first Indians the Spanish conquistador Francisco Vazquez de Coronado had contact with when he ventured onto the Kansas prairies.
And, their ancestors were the Etzanoans, the ancient village near Arkansas City where archaeological digs have uncovered not only artifacts from the village but evidence of a Spanish battle in 1601.
The range of the ancestors of the Wichita tribe included regions in Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas.
But in the mid-1860s, the Wichita were caught up in the politics of the Civil War.
The federal government ordered them in the fall of 1867 to leave Kansas and embark on a 260-mile walk to the Washita River, near Anadarko, Okla., where they were re-assigned to live.
It wouldn’t be until at least eight decades later that the doors of Wichita would be open again to the Wichita and Kanza and other Native American tribes. That was when Wichita was in need of people for its aircraft plants.
Priscilla Zadoka is one of the few Wichita tribal members who now live in Wichita. She and her husband moved in 1963 from Anadarko. There are other tribal members who live in Haysville and Mulvane.
“For me personally, this is a comfortable place to call home,” said Zadoka, now 75. “I am very . . . I don’t like to use the word proud; we use that too much, but I feel very happy to be who I am because of the way I grew up. I know a lot of the old ways . . . There is a feeling that we as native people have persevered. We are still here.”
Kansas
In 1854, a new territory was opened for settlement. Seven years later, on Jan. 29, 1861, Kansas became a state.
The tribal members had no say on what the new state’s name would be. They were forced to leave Kansas for Indian Territory, now Oklahoma, in 1873.
Their language is still vital:
Hawe’ Zhazhe wita che Ta Wak’O, which means “Hello, my name is Pauline Eads Sharp.”
She is a Kaw Nation Tribal citizen and lives in Wichita.
“We are also known as Kansa, but we call ourselves Kanza, which is the way it is pronounced in our language,” Sharp said. “We are the tribe from whom the state of Kansas took its name.”
In the language of the Kanza People, it is Kaa’ze, meaning “People of the South Wind,” Sharp said.
Sharp is the granddaughter of Chief Lucy Tayiah Eads, the first female chief of the Kanza Nation.
Her grandfather was Chief Washungah, a principal chief in Indian Territory.
“Our ancestors are buried here, and their descendants come to dance here still,” Sharp said of the state of Kansas. “This land holds our history in its rocks and hills, the rivers and trees . . .
“I absolutely believe we as a nation, a state and a city, need to assess where we are, decide what needs to be done, and get on with making changes for a better future. But how can we be mindful of history when it isn’t taught correctly? My father-in-law, Jim Sharp, always says, the victors write the history. But can healing really begin if we cannot even acknowledge the past?”
She urged Wichitans to learn Native American history and truly get to know the stories of the people who were here originally.
Carrying a legacy
Ancestors of the Wichita, along with affiliated tribes, the Tawakoni, Waco, Keechi or Kichai, are all related, Zadoka said.
“A lot of knowledge is passed from the women. I am bearing a lot of things. That’s who we are. So much of the Wichita’s history has been written by white men and what have we lost by doing that? We have lost a lot of gems of knowledge, of caring and perspective. By ignoring women, something has been lost in translation.”
On the website, www.texasindians.com, Rebecca Brush writes of how the American painter George Catlin — who specialized in Native American portraits, painted portraits of the Wichita and said they were not like other Plains Indians “because they were darker, shorter and stockier. He also said they had many tattoos on their faces and bodies … They (the tattoos) were not of animals or people or other common objects. All the Wichita’s tattoos were lines, both solid and dotted, and circles.”
In 1910, Oresemus Hills Bentley, author of the “History of Wichita and Sedgwick County” wrote that “Wichita” meant “tattooed faces.” But that definition incensed developer J.R. Mead, who said Wichita meant “scattered lodges.”
Zadoka said the Wichita call themselves “Kitikitish,” which means “Raccoon eyes.”
Zadoka said her wish, at age 75, is simply for the city of Wichita to recognize the contributions Wichita and other Native Americans have made to the city.
“Find out more about how we came to be,” she said. “I would like to see more Indian faces featured in the city. How many Indian people brought their families up here during World War II to work in the airplane factories? How many came here to go to the university? And, even though I have burgundy soon-to-be-purple hair, I don’t fit the stereotype of what an Indian woman is supposed to look like. I say, ‘honor the Wichita heritage in Wichita.”
Pauline Sharp says she has learned through the years to live “Ye-ga’-ha,” meaning as a Kaw in a Kaw place.
“Almost every tribe has a removal story,” Sharp said. “We were very close to being exterminated. Contact with white settlers brought diseases like smallpox and cholera . . . Also, with loss of the land, the people had to go to the cities to find work. I recently had a country friend give me a bad time for being a ‘city girl.’ I smiled and said, “I hear people talk about growing up on a farm. Some of us didn’t get to do that.
“You all took our land and we had to go to the city to find work. You don’t get to take the land then make fun of me for being a city girl. We had a good laugh. But we survived, we are still here. We still have our language and we reclaim our heritage and culture every chance we get.”
Recognizing the goodness
Both women say living in Kansas and Wichita is all about living with opportunity.
“It’s hard not to be cynical these days,” Sharp said. “But as a resident of Kansas for 61 years, I see a bright future for Wichita. I hope the young, native people in this city will get involved. Our future lies in our youth. Help them to learn in a good way.
“Kansas did not ask our permission to use our name. But since it did, our history and legacies will forever be intertwined. One of my favorite quotes is from the movie, ‘The Last of the Dogmen’: What happened was inevitable. The way it happened was unconscionable.”
Sharp’s hope is that Wichita become more receptive to the diversity of its residents.
“Wichita is the embodiment of what Kansas is,” Sharp said.
Zadoka’s hope is found in family, in celebrating the generations of the past and the future.
“Wichita is a place not to get away from,” she said. “It is not a place to move away from. So many young people leave Wichita, Kansas, but what for? There are opportunities here for education. There is such a wealth of possibilities in this town.
“Are the ancestors here? Yes. And what are they saying?
“This is, indeed, a good place. There is still an entrepreneurial spirit of possibility here that can be passed on.”
And so, on today’s official 150th birthday of Wichita the two women say:
Learn from the voices.
Have hope.
Recognize and take opportunities.
“Wichita is not just a story of white people, you miss out on so much, if that is the story,” Sharp said. “There is so much diversity here.
“Of course, I want a good future for Wichita. I’ve been here most of my life. I’ve had children here, grandchildren.
“It is my home.”
This story was originally published July 21, 2020 at 5:01 AM.