THE GREEN CORN DANCE
Frances Jenkins Olcott
The first Thanksgiving Dinner in America, where was it eaten? Why, of course, we think of its being eaten in old Plymouth Town, when the Pilgrim Fathers spread their board with fish, wild turkey, geese, ducks, venison, barley bread, Indian maize, and other good things, and invited the Indian King Massasoit and his braves to the feast. It was a time of rejoicing and thanksgiving for the fine harvest God had given the Pilgrims.
But that was not the first Thanksgiving Dinner eaten in America! For many, many years before the Pilgrims came to this land, Thanksgiving Dinners had been given. The Red Men, the first owners of America, held their Thanksgiving Festivals every autumn. These were in celebration of the ripening of the corn, and in honour of their Manitos, as they called their gods. For, until the white men came, the Indians never heard of the all-good “Great Spirit” of Heaven. They held other feasts, too, among them a New Year one, a Maple Sugar Feast, a Strawberry Festival, a Bean Dance, and a Corn-gathering Feast.
Even to-day, some Indians keep their heathen Thanksgiving at the time of the ripening of the corn. It is called the Green Corn Dance. Many Indians are Christians, but numbers still worship the Manitos of the sun, moon, stars, wind, rain, thunder, and other things in Nature. Though some of these heathen Red Men speak reverently of the Great Spirit, they seem scarcely to understand who He is, and confuse Him with their Manitos, as may be seen in the hymn that introduces the Feather Dance.
Among some tribes of the Iroquois Family, in New York State, the Green Corn Dance is still celebrated. And this is how a visitor saw the dance at the Cattaraugus Reservation.
As the time for the Festival approached, certain men and women of the tribe, called the “Keepers of the Faith,” began to prepare for the dance. Every morning at sunrise, the women went to the cornfield and picked a few ears, and took them to the Head Man at the Council House. When he decided that the corn was sufficiently ripe, the Feast was called.
Summons were sent to the Indians at the Tonawanda and Allegany Reservations, bidding all meet at sunrise on the tenth of September, in the Council House of the Cattaraugus Reservation.