Page 121 - Confronting Race Women and Indians on the Frontier, 1815 - 1915

FRONTIER P R O C E S S : VILIFYING

perhaps thousands, of invented massacres, in which the brave u.s.
Cavalry emerged victorious I 06
.
As on the trail, however, many women eventually settled down.
Mabel Beavers, the young teacher who had been so afraid of her
American Indian charges, discovered that "those people were lovely to
me, and were and are yet, some of the warmest fr iends I have ever
had." I 0 7 The young woman who had answered her door with shotgun
in hand, and who on other occasions had run f o r the house and barred
the doors and windows in the f a ce of approaching Indians, recollected
that the anticipated war whoop never reached her ears. "Finally we were
not so afraid of them," she observed, "becoming well acquainted with
dozens of bucks and squaws in later years and counting them as some
of our best f r iends." I0 8 The little girl who timorously watched
American Indians pass by her house on Sunday mornings grew up to
marry "a f u ll blood Comanche Indian," and upon his death she wed "a
f u ll blood Cherokee." I0 9
Evidently, many settlers came to realize that Indian rumors were
usually nothing more than figments of someone's overactive imagina­
tion. As they became seasoned f r ontier people, they realized that they
and their neighbors seldom experienced serious altercations and con­
f r ontations with American Indians. The relaxation of their defensive
postures toward Indians allowed them to interact more f r eely with
individual Indians, which often gave them more confidence in the
rationality of Indians. As one might expect, however, all settlers did not
surrender their biases against native peoples they encountered. Many
held tightly to their own preconceptions despite a barrage of challeng­
ing evidence. Not only did the scares and speculation confirm what they
already believed to be true, but it impeded any meaningful communi­
cation with Native Americans that might have reshaped their attitudes.
Even though Native Americans rarely played out their parts in the
dramas concocted by overwrought f r ontier people, the more timorous
settlers never surrendered their ideas concerning Indians. For instance,
as a child Anne Ellis of Nebraska was fr ightened of starvation, ghosts,
and Indians. Long after she outgrew her qualms about f o od and ghosts,
she still dreamed of fleeing f r om native pursuers, "of running f r om them
till my fe et rose f r om the ground and I ran in the air."IIo

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