[joannalou]

Hello all. I am of African American and Native American descent with a splash of caucasian blood in there too, just because this is the South and that is what happened here. I’ve always been aware of my native heritage on my father’s side (Western Cherokee, Nowata, Oklahoma, Rogers County, Rogers and Reed surnames) but it’s my mother’s side that has been the part that keeps me searching and surprised. I’m from Indian Woods, NC. It’s a backwoods collection of communities located in Bertie County in Northeastern, North Carolina. It was the last home to the Tuscarora Indian Nation and the home of their reservation (hence the name “Indian Woods”) before the Tuscarora joined the Iroquois Confederacy/Six Nations in upstate New York. As I read your site, I realize that Saponi culture may have been a part of the equation as well. Native Culture has left its mark on Indian Woods. Our mix of African/Amerindian/Colonial culture is the topic of current research by historian Arwin Smallwood (a native of Indian Woods, author of Bertie County, A History), who is trying to trace the inward migration of NC’s coastal Indian tribes from the outer banks and the possible link between the Tuscarora and the disappearance of the Lost Colony on Roanoke Island. In the past year he has come regularly to do seminars and conduct research. He is planning to do genetic testing to see if there is a link between the Afro/Indian people in Indian Woods and the known families in England whose relatives were amongst those lost in the Lost Colony on Roanoke Island. It’s very interesting stuff. He also wants to create a virtual archive for the Internet that catalogues where all of the slave and indian burial grounds are located in Indian Woods. In addition to this historical activity, there have been several archeological finds – Indian remains/burial sites along the Cashie and Roanoke river basin that have been excavated and studied by East Carolina University, a local university, which have been fascinating to read about, if you can dig up the information – it is not easily found. Until recently, I didn’t suspect that I’d gotten any of my native blood from my mother. Her family, like the majority of families in Indian Woods (and most African Americans as a whole) is obviously of mixed heritage. I knew that many of the ways and understandings of things that I had been taught by my family were very earth bound, with possible tribal cultural influence, but no one had ever labeled it “Indian”, so I just went on and affiliated my “blood” tie to native culture as coming from my father. It was not until I had my own child and decided to get genetically tested, so I could better explain my exact heritage to her, that I began to suspect that my mother’s family was home to some of my native ancestry as well. From what my mother explained about my father’s family (they are all dead and buried now in Oklahoma, California, and Washington State) I should have been about 1/16 from his side. When I got tested by Gene Tree, I was over twice that much as far as American Indian blood quantum. When I questioned my mother, I brought up one of the first things I’d noticed about my heritage – I have a shovel-shaped incisor (teeth found 99% in Native Americans and Asians and less than 1% in other ethnic groups).I discovered what my “strange tooth” was called in Anthropology lab while we were studying primate dentition (I was an Anthropology minor in undergrad at ECU). I asked my professor, Dr. Wolf, about my tooth. She looked at it, pulled out her dentition book and said, “Read. You have a shovel-shaped incisor. That is indicative of Native American ancestry. Did you know you have Native American ancestry?” Anyway, my mother looked at my took again through her bifocals and said, “Some of my brothers had those teeth.” My mother had nine brothers. I was shocked. I never thought of my mother’s family as being my Native American side even though we are from Indian Woods. Because both sides of my native ancestry are matrilineal, that would mean I would be identified through my mother’s tribe, not my father’s. All of these years I have thought of my Indian culture as being Cherokee, but all the while I needed to be searching closer to home. I may still go to Oklahoma, look up birth records, check the Dawes Rolls, but for now, I just want to look out of my window, out into the shadows of the trees surrounding my yard and imagine those who walked, hunted and dwelled here in Indian Woods long before slavery, colonists and the like, and know and understand that their blood is running through my veins.

[Steve-o]

Shovel teeth, as well as everything else Brent Kennedy spoke of in his books as being indicative of Native American, Melungeon, or whatever, has been proven to be not true. Search my posts and you will find out why. Pure fantasy. Shovel teeth are not restricted to native or Asian people, anyone from anywhere can have them.

[techteach]

Try mtDNA testing. It will tell you if your female line is NA and is more reliable than the DNA testing that you had done. That being said, the testing you had done has a place for those of us whose lines are broken by males, as is mine. If yours is matrilineal, the mtDNA results might be interesting.

Techteach

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