June 26 Comanche

The Imposter Uncovered; Sweet Medicine and Comanche; Farms and Silos; Another hint for the quiz

We were up early with “jet” lag. Really, yesterday seems like when we left La Crosse, I could hear the announcer, “We have ignition. We have liftoff.” And the three rockets arced into the west over the Mississippi, through Minnesota and through most of South Dakota landing finally in Rapid City. So picture a dog race where they have an automated rabbit that leads the greyhounds around the track. That was us, with Griff being the rabbit and Bill, Bob and I being the greyhounds. Anyway, we rode the 26 miles to Sturgis and pulled into the Best Western parking lot, where Griff aka the Imposter, greeted us, looking fit and very tan from his trip. After hugs and fist butts all around, and a bunch of photos and remarks about our filthy bikes, we proceeded to Fort Meade Museum, the real goal of our trip. There we met Chuck Rambow, the curator, who warmly welcomed us and marveled at our trip. He took us to the room where the commission (signed by President McKinley and Secretary of War Elihu Root) of our grandfather, Charles Fenton, as a Captain in the US Army was prominently displayed in a glass frame, with the newspaper article about how it took 107 years to get to Fort Meade positioned below the commission, and three photos of Fort Meade taken around the time of Captain Fenton’s sojourn there. In a glassed-in case, there were additional materials pertaining to the 13th Cavalry with a large photo of Captain Fenton on his horse in front of one of the Fort buildings. And the Fort had no stockade! Really what type of Fort is that?
Now pay attention. I want to tell you two stories Rambow told to us (and a family reunion) upstairs in a common room. First, he told us about Sweet Medicine. Bear Butte is a tepee shaped mountain near Fort Meade, a mountain that has been a most sacred place to the Indians for thousands of years, the place where the canoe landed during the time of the Great Flood. There is a medical circle there, a sacred circle, and there are four others, one due north in Saskatchewan; another due east in Milwaukee; another due south and another due west, both hundreds of miles away. If you draw a line connecting the north and south circles, and if you draw a line connecting the east and west circles, the point of intersection is Bear Butte. How amazing is that! Sweet Medicine was a 14 year old Indian living in Wisconsin who killed a buffalo. After cuttiing the meat for his tribe, he kept the skin for himself. It was a special skin. It was white. An elder asked him for it four times and SM denied his request each time. So the elder finally took the skin. There was an angry encounter and SM took it back from the elder, a serious crime in the tribe. The elder told SM that he better leave before the male members of his tribe returned for they would beat him badly for this infraction of tribe rules. So Sweet Medicine embarked on a journey, a journey that ended at Bear Butte. He married a local Indian and then when he was 18, an elder Lakota (perhaps?) told him that he had had a vision that SM returned to his people to help them. He protested, “But they will beat me.” And the elder told him they would not because he would give them two gifts that would be valuable to his tribe - they were four arrows, two black and two white. Back in Wisconsin, at the Cheyenne tribe, they believed that they would be saved by a man bringing arrows, two black and two white. So SM returned to his tribe with the arrows and he was greeted like a Messiah once they saw the arrows. And they became the best warriors and the best hunters, due to learning about these new arrows. Sweet Medicine also returned with the teachings of his adopted tribe, the four commandments that they still live by: thou shall not kill; thou shall not steal; thou shall not commit adultery; and thou shall not marry within your family.
Comanche was a horse that survived the battle at Little Big Horn, the massacre of General Custer’s men in a mismatch where 600 soldiers fought a losing battle against 3 or 4,000 braves. Today is the 133d anniversary of the battle. Comanche, waiting patiently for his master to return, was found by Captain Reno’s men and recovered. He became the pampered pet of the Seventh Cavalry. On parade dates, he was dressed in mourning, and led the parades, riderless, each year. Even when the Seventh Cavalry moved to Fort Riley in 1887, they took Comanche with them. He died there in 1891 at the age of 29, a beloved symbol of loyalty in the face of withering gunfire and mayhem.
There are several distinctive characteristics of the farms we saw along the way in Minnesota and South Dakota. The farm house is usually white, and is shielded to the north and west by trees, probably to cut the harsh northwest winds of winter. Many outbuildings are red, and they would include a barn and several outbuildings. And there would be silos, silos of different lengths..., I mean, of different heights; and of varying circumferences, but all appear to be circumcised. And how do they get the corn or whatever in the silos?
For those who haven’t gotten the answer to the quiz, here’s another hint: I said, “Be careful. HIs bowtie is really a camera.”
It’s nice to be all together again. And we miss Kit who would have appreciated the care to Charles Fenton’s memorabilia taken by Mr. Rambow. So, Dad, you would be proud of our journey to learn more about your father who died when you were only 5. And I remember you telling us that your only memory of your father was his letting you sit on his horse. Now we have more memories and we want to share them.
Off to get oil changes, etc., in the morning tomorrow, then back to the Fort for Fort Meade Cavalry Days, and finishing up with a ride to Spearfish and back through a beautiful canyon. Good night.