Society fighting for indigenous people in Quincy Thursday to meet with Human Rights Commission, Park District

QUINCY — Two members of the Great Plains Action Society will be visiting Quincy and talking about their work at the Human Rights Commission meeting on Thursday night.

The non-profit society has been throughout the United States to advocate and fight for Native American (or indigenous) land, rights and sovereignty. It is focused on the Great Plains region, which includes Iowa, Nebraska, South Dakota and North Dakota.

Representation Director Jessica Engelking and Sikowis Nobiss, the society’s founder and executive director, will arrive at the Quincy Park District headquarters, 1231 Bonansinga Drive, at noon Thursday. They will tour with Quincy Park District staff the burial mounds at Parker Heights, Bonansinga Drive and Indian Mounds Park, 1500 S. Fifth, at 1 p.m.

Engelking and Nobiss will meet at 3:30 p.m. with a youth group at Bella Ease Community Services, 707 Broadway, to talk about Native American history. The Human Rights Commission meeting is scheduled to begin at 6:30 p.m. in City Council chambers at City Hall, 730 Maine.

Mark Philpot, a member of the Human Rights Commission and a Park Board commissioner, helped arrange the meeting, which is open to the public.

“As it relates to the Human Rights Commission, we’ve been trying to connect people with different viewpoints to the community at large,” he said. “From the Park District’s aspect, we are stewards of the land. That’s part of what we do. We are entrusted with these beautiful gifts that have been given to us, and as a part of that stewardship, we kind of have to recognize those gifts didn’t just fall out of the sky. They came from somewhere.

“I did some digging to find places that may allow us to present a different viewpoint and kind of dive into that history. Quincy has a lot of people with Native American heritage but no way to connect to that lineage. This group might help us reconnect with that. We have a number of events that go on during the course of the year that tap into part of Quincy’s history, but this goes back even further.”

Philpot says the Keokuk, Iowa-based Standing Bear Council, the host of the annual Great River Eagle Days event each January in Quincy, has provided exposure to Native American history and culture for many years.

“There’s a larger picture going on across our country dealing with the question of responsible environmentalism and telling the story of history that might somewhat conflict with what we’ve been taught in our school systems,” Philpot said. “This is an opportunity to look at things through a wider lens. We’ve all heard of things that happened in Quincy involving these people from the 1800s and 1900s. But who were they? What was their real connection?

“What we’re taught in school about what has happened with the Native American tribes that have come to this region may or may not be the whole story.”

Philpot says the Great Plains Action Society is searching for answers as well while delving into the history of Native American culture in this area.

“A lot of those first Native American groups traveled through the same areas, pathways from the southeast United States all the way up through the Great Plains,” he said. “They traveled through the Tri-State area. This is an opportunity to kind of bring some of that history to light and talk about those things in a forum that normally wouldn’t happen.”

Philpot said he learned of the society because of a recent presentation it made at the Englert Theatre in Iowa City, Iowa. He hopes some of what is learned during Thursday’s visit could eventually be incorporated into the curriculum at Quincy’s public schools.

“They’re very excited to come to Quincy,” Philpot said. “This is a rare event. This is something that hasn’t been done before. We’re kind of treading on new ground. The goal is to bring awareness and education to our community about our rich history and our rich lineage.”