Uptown's American Indian Center Hosts Successful Powwow

Chicago’s American Indian Center, located at 1630 W. Wilson in Uptown, recently hosted its 54th annual powwow around the theme “Honoring Our Tribal Nations.” About 200 dancers and 10 different drum groups gathered in Chicago to celebrate. Read about the event and learn more about the history of Chicago's Native American population by visiting Medill Reports and the American Indian Center. View historic photos of Native Americans in Chicago at the Library of Congress.

Thumbnail image of totem pole, 1929. To see full size image, go to the Library of Congress. Caption reads: "Image of a group of Native American adults and children wearing traditional Native American clothing and headdresses standing next to a totem pole on a field in Chicago, Illinois, holding up their hands toward to totem pole. A crowd is standing in the background." A replica of the totem pole is located at Addison and the Lake near the north tip of Belmont Harbor, where the bike trail turns into Belmont Harbor Drive going south; the original was returned to the Haidan people in 1985.

Uptown's Native American Population

American Indians Leave Uptown Behind

Originally published in The Chicago Reporter
by Stephanie Williams

Marilyn Miller was 12 when she and her family arrived in Chicago's Uptown neighborhood during the hot and muggy summer of 1967. Looking for better job opportunities, they moved from the Lac du Flambeau Chippewa reservation in northern Wisconsin under a federal program known as relocation that offered stipends to American Indians who wanted to move from reservations into cities starting in 1952.

The family moved into an apartment at 4939 N. Broadway St. But Miller was disappointed with her new home.

"The quality, the area, the look didn't match the idea of what I had. Everything was dirty and cluttered. The big city didn't seem so pretty anymore," Miller recalled. "I choked back the tears."

She debated whether to tell her dad, a loving but stern man, how she felt. When she did finally muster up the courage, he told her they were staying in Chicago.

"'You never go back, you always move forward,'" Miller said he told her.

Except for a year and a half in the early 1990s, she has lived in Chicago ever since.

Her story is a common one: Thousands of Native Americans moved to Chicago from reservations and other rural areas in the second half of the 20th century. As community and social service organizations were established in or near Uptown, the area soon became the anchor of the city's American Indian community...

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