Native Americans Project Reliable Sources

Profile managers: Jillaine Smith [send private message] and Native Americans Project WikiTree [send private message]

Reliable and unreliable sources per Wikitree's Native Americans Project. A work in progress...

Reliable Sources

Note: WikiTree places a strong emphasis on sources, especially for vital statistics and relationships. We realize that this emphasis sometimes conflicts with oral tradition often associated with Native American ancestry. We try to reflect family tradition in the narrative while at the same time following WikiTree's standards for sourcing when it comes to relationships and vitals.

Ancestry.com and FamilySearch have digitzed Indian censuses from 1880 - 1940:

• United States Census, 1910 Indian Population, Minnesota - White Earth Reservation
• United States, Native American, Census Rolls, 1885-1940 (FamilySearch)

Cherokee

Some reliable sources for Cherokee history and genealogy are:

• Dawes Commission (Cherokee, Choctaw, Chikasaw, Creek and Seminole Tribes/ Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes)
  • Dawes Index: Cherokee
• Guion Miller Commission. The Guion Miller payment was for all Cherokee/Cherokee descendants who were affected by Removal; there was no residence requirement. The Dawes Commission awarded individual land allotments to Cherokee living in Indian Territory. The Guion Miller Commission awarded individual payments.

Wikitree Cherokee pages (includes book list):

• Cherokee Team page
• list of rolls and records
• list of Cherokee books and articles (should be moved here)
• Finding a Cherokee Ancestor
• Cherokee Genealogy Before 1800
• explanation of Dawes Rolls
• explanation of card information

New England Tribes

• https://www.nativenortheastportal.com/

Several institutions that have significant New England Indian collections have organized into a cooperative endeavor called The Yale Indian Papers Project to address these problems by publishing an electronic database known as The Native Northeast Portal. The Portal represents a scholarly critical edition of New England Native American primary source materials gathered presently from the partner institutions into one robust virtual collection, where the items are digitized, transcribed, annotated, and edited to the highest academic standards and then made freely available over the Internet, using open-source software.

• David Allen Lambert (comp.) , Massachusetts: Earle Report of Native Americans, 1861, (database); Boston: New England Historic Genealogical Society (2020); index to the Appendix of 1861 Massachusetts Earle Report of Native Americans from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Includes the names, tribal membership, tribe/race, and location where the Native Americans resided in Massachusetts in 1861. The database is searchable by name, location, and tribe. The index contains nearly 1,700 searchable names. This is available only to members of NEHGS.

DNA

• New Native American Mitochondrial Haplogroups, by Roberta Estes
• Native American DNA Resources, Roberta Estes

Unreliable Sources

• Don Greene, Shawnee Heritage
• Frankin Elawatum Bearce
• Unsourced family trees or pedigrees, including those found on ancestry.com and familysearch.org.

WikiTree Resources

Remember a lot of questions can be answered by referring to the help pages link at the top right of all Wikitree pages.

• Native American History
• Native Americans Project Images
• Native Americans of the French and Indian War
• Trail of Tears
• Native Americans in the Civil War
• Creek War, Battles and Forts

• How to Find Hidden Native American Ancestors

Additional References

The following have not been reviewed for accuracy. Use with caution.

Native American Genealogy Search Sites / Indexes

• Cyndi's List - American Indian focuses on genealogy
• Native Americans in Michigan. Highly genealogical.
• Index of American Indian Genealogy Resources on the Internet. Quite a mix; Ideally we extract the best from this and incorporate the best above.

Guides to Conducting Native American Genealogy

• Bureau of Indian Affairs A guide to tracing American Indian and Alaska Native Ancestry

• National Archives guide

• Tracing your Genealogy (National Indian Law Library)

• FamilySearch Native American Page wiki

Maps

• Emerson Kent.com - Indian Posts, Tribes, and Battles 1860-1890.
• Native Languages - Maps of American Indian Tribes and Reservations
• This Land press - MAP OF THE WEEK: Native American Nations
• Flutopedia.com - Native American Indian Tribal Maps
• Emerson Kent.com - Map of the United States - Native American Tribes.
• Wikimedia Commons - Maps of Native American tribal territories
• 500 Nations - 500 Nations, Tribes, Bands
• Ancient Wisdom - American Indian Tribes
• Emerson Kent - A collection of Native American maps.

Indigenous Population Maps

• Native American and Alaskan population Map
• Maps of North, Central and South America
• Tribes of the United States, clickable to state level
• Tribes you may not have seen before.
• Native American Maps
• Maps of American Indian Tribes and Reservations
• Historical Tribal Maps

Books

• Geronimo Stilton, The Wild, Wild West
• The 'Real' Wild West
• Carol H. Behrman, The Indian Wars
• Anita J. Ellis, Susan L. Meyn, Rookwood and the American Indian: Masterpieces of American Art Pottery
• Arlene B. Hirschfelder, Paulette Fairbanks Molin, The Extraordinary Book of Native American Lists

Images

links reviewed 16 Feb 2023

• Pictures of Native Americans in the United States (U.S. National Archives and Records Administration)
• Native American Cultures (History.com)
• Pictorial Americana Western life and Indian fighting (US Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Reading Room)
• [http://www.firstpeople.us/FP-Html-Pictures/old_photos_pg01.html Old photographs of American Indians by Edward S Curtis) (First Peoples US)
• Pictures of the Native Americans (WarPaths2Peacepipes.com)
• Native Americans: Portraits From a Century Ago (The Atlantic, April 2013)
• Donna R. Causey, Rare, vivid portraits of Native Americans from Buffalo Bills Wild West Show (Days Gone By [blog]) undated
• Paul Ratner, Rare, Old Photos of Native American Women and Children (HuffPost.com Blog, Apr 2013; updated 2017)
• The Collection of Native American Photographs (Pitt Rivers Museum) describes the physical (non-digital) collection available to visitors of this museum at Oxford University in the UK

Census Information

• US GenWebProject_Native American Census_Transcribers Needed
• Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center-microfilm Indians of North America Census
• WikiTree Source page (with links and citation examples):
  • National Archives and Records Service Indian Census of the United States,1885-1940 (United States, 1965) Microfilm collection at https://archive.org/details/indian_census.
• 1927 Potawatomi Indian Census - Film # 007141235 - Pg 7 -Potawatomi 30 Jun 1927 Census- Kansas

https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QS7-89W8-S94W-Z?i=6&cc=2761958

• Indian census rolls, Flathead, 1886-1939 Flathead (Montana) Flathead, Kutenai, Kalispel, Pend d'Oreille, Spokan Indians 1895-1897 and 1900-1905 [NOTE: 1895 includes upper and middle bands of Spokan. 1897 includes Michel's Band of Lower Kalispel, Kootenai's from Idaho and Lower Spokan removed to Jocko Agency. 1898-1899 are missing. 1900-1901 Flathead. 1902-1905 Flathead and confederated tribes. NARA Series M595, Roll 108, Indian census rolls, 1885-1940, Flathead (Montana) Flathead, Kutenai, Kalispel, Spokan, Pend d'Oreille Indians 1895-1897, 1900-1905 [NOTE: Includes Confederated tribes, Charlo's Band of Flathead, Kutenai from Idaho, Lower Kalispel, Michel's Band of Kalispel, Spokan removed to Jocko Agency, Flathead Indians. 1898 and 1899 are missing.] (NARA Series M595, Roll 108), Citation- ["United States, Native American, Census Rolls, 1885-1940," database, FamilySearch https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QS7-89W8-M6KH?cc=2761958] : 27 August 2019, > image 1 of 1; citing (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1967).

• [1904 Flathead & Confederated Tribes of Flathead, Montana, dg.pg.start img. 418 https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QS7-89W8-M6KH?cc=2761958&personaUrl=%2Fark%3A%2F61903%2F1%3A1%3AQPT9-8BQK]

• Access Genealogy Census rolls from 1885-1940
• 1910 Census Fort Shaw Industrial School
• Parsons and Abbott Roll 1832 Creek Tribe. By a treaty of March 24, 1832, the Creek Tribe ceded to the United States all of their land east of the Mississippi River. Heads of families were entitled to tracts of land, which, if possible, were to include their improvements. In 1833 Benjamin S. Parsons and Thomas J. Abbott prepared a census of Creek Indian heads of families, which gave their names and the number of males, females, and slaves in each family. The entries were arranged by town and numbered; these numbers were used for identification in later records. Source: Access Genealogy
• Native Americans – Most American Indians in the US were not counted on the 1810 Census. At this time, “Indians not taxed,” which were those living on reservations or in unsettled territory, were not counted. - See more at: http://www.genealogyinc.com/census-records/1810-census/#sthash.RAlHZwH7.dpuf

Sources