On April 12, the Duke community will celebrate the 45th anniversary of the Grateful Dead concert at Cameron Indoor Stadium. Widely regarded as a top show that year, the band delivered smoking renditions of “Jack Straw,” “Bertha,” “Good Lovin’,” and “Eyes of the World,” as you can hear for yourself in the video above.
To commemorate this historic show, join us for a special panel discussion, selections from the remastered video recording, live music, and refreshments on Wednesday, April 12, at 6:00 p.m. in the Ruby Lounge of the Rubenstein Arts Center.
A panel of Dead experts will share their interpretations of the show, including Professor Eric Mlyn; show volunteer and former Duke University Union coordinator Peter Coyle; and John Brackett, author of the forthcoming book Live Dead: The Grateful Dead, Live Recordings and the Ideology of Liveness, coming out next fall from Duke University Press. The book will be the first in a new Duke University Press series, Studies in the Grateful Dead, in the fall of 2023.
Bridget Booher, Director of Duke WIN, will moderate the panel. Footage featuring selected songs from the concert will be screened. After the program, local Dead cover band The Loose Lucies will perform for an hour. Refreshments will be served.
Professor Mlyn teaches a first-year seminar about the Grateful Dead. His students researched the band’s performances at Duke from 1971 to 1982 and curated an exhibit in Perkins Library. According to Mlyn, “4/12/78 was a raucous and animated performance and has been widely recognized by Deadheads as one of the best shows that year. The band was preparing for a trip to Egypt and it was the last full year of shows for keyboardist Keith Godchaux and his wife Donna whose unforgettable vocals punctuated shows during that era.”
Native Americans in North Carolina:
the Path from the Past to the Present
The research and suggested resources presented in the article Imagining Duke’s Campus in 1000 AD inspire the Lilly Library exhibit: Native Americans in North Carolina: the Path from the Past to the Present. Tangible artifacts and reference material highlighting the history of Native Americans in North Carolina carry us together on a journey over time to the campus experience of today. The exhibit presents historical evidence predating European contact, records and accounts of the university’s Native American student experience, and a look at the extent of Native American tribal reach in present day North Carolina.
North Carolina: The Arrival of Europeans
A New Voyage to Carolina, John Lawson (1709)
When the first Europeans arrived in what they called Carolina, the 16th century surveyor John White depicted in detail the established villages and individuals living on the land near Roanoke. A century later John Lawson catalogued the peoples and bounty of the land he traveled. His account A New Voyage to Carolina (produced in 1709) revealed the diversity of nature especially flora and of the nations of Native Americans. An original edition of Lawson’s book is found in the Rubenstein Library collection but does not circulate.
For Duke community members with NetIDs who wish to examine Lawson’s work, reprints and online versions are readily available.
Duke: The Arrival of Joseph S. Maytubby
Joseph S. Maytubby (Image from Duke University Archives)
The relationship between Duke and its Native American constituents goes back further in history than one might expect. In 1892, Trinity College (the predecessor to Duke University) saw the arrival of Joseph S. Maytubby on its campus in Durham. Maytubby, a member of the Chickasaw tribe became the first Native American to receive a degree from Trinity College. An excellent student, he served as president of the Hesperian Literary Society, was involved with the Trinity Archive literary magazine, played football, and, as a capstone to his stellar academic career, his oratory skills won the Wiley Gray Medal competition for the 1896 commencement.
In present day, the Duke Native American Student Alliance serves as a resource and advocates on behalf of Native American Students on campus. Read its mission statement to learn more. One element of NASA’s stated mission is to advance the awareness of Native American culture throughout campus and the state.
Map of NC Tribal Communities – source: North Carolina Dept. of Administration
It is not generally known that North Carolina has the largest Native American population east of the Mississippi River. North Carolina is home to eight tribes recognized tribes by the state, including the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Nation – the only federally recognized Native American community in North Carolina. This exhibit offers a glimpse into the complicated and often uncomfortable history of the Native American tale.
The Lilly Library exhibit Native Americans in North Carolina: the Path from the Past to the Present is on display until March 1, 2022.
Curated by Librarians Greta Boers and Carson Holloway. Artifacts on display are from the collections of Carson Holloway and Greta Boers.
John “Blackfeather” Jeffries blesses 25-acres of new land acquired by the Occaneechi Band of the Saponi Nation. Photograph used with permission by Ted Richardson, TEDRICHARDSONMEDIA.COM
This post is part of a series intended to introduce first-year students to the diverse history of Duke and Durham. These posts are brief introductions, but include more detailed resources for further reading and exploration.
Many formal gatherings in the Americas begin with acknowledgement and prayer for the indigenous people of the past, and to honor those among us now. Other examples of respect are the Duke Forest Land Acknowledgement Statement and the Eno River Association’s Land Acknowledgement which bow to the Yésah, “the people”, the collection of tribes who have lived on the North Carolina and Virginia Piedmonts. As you find your way to class, you may wonder who was walking over Duke’s campus 1200 years ago. Where are their descendants?
North Carolina has the highest number of Native Americans east of the Mississippi. A map reconstructing ancient languages of the Southeast identifies three clusters: Iroquois, Siouan, and Muskhogean. Two range across the state. To the west are the Iroquois linguistic family, the present-day Eastern Band of Cherokee. In the Piedmont, southern, and the eastern parts of the State are the remaining tribes of the Siouan (Tutelo) linguistic family: Coharie, Haliwa-Saponi, Sappony, Waccamaw, Meherrin, Lumbee, and Occaneechi.
How far back can we go in order to imagine the people who lived here? Much of what we know draws on archaeological evidence from the Haw River Drainage area, Yadkin River, and Roanoke Rapids. The Research Laboratories of Archaeology at the University of North Carolina includes a list of contextual excavations going back to 10,000 BC in the Piedmont—where you are now– with descriptions of culture and life for every age, starting with the Clovis culture of the Pleistocene. The Ancient North Carolinians website includes a pre-Colonial section for the Central Piedmont.
More recent accounts, summarized in NCPedia, describe the Occaneechi and Sappony nations as documented by Europeans starting in the 17th century. There are also accounts of the more ancient Shakori and Eno tribes of the Piedmont, and the Tuscarora towards the east. Two centuries later, Andrew Jackson’s Indian Removal Act of 1830 began the forced removal of the Cherokee from Georgia in the Trail of Tears. A band of 300-400 escaped to the mountains in western North Carolina, and eventually bought what is now the Qualla reservation. It is from there that Duke’s first Native American students arrived in 1881 to attend Trinity College and the Cherokee Industrial School.
This isn’t enough to understand what’s beneath your feet, or to recognize who might be walking beside you. In the mixture of oral traditions, documentation, and historical interpretations, what are the real stories? You can visit the excavations closest to Duke in Hillsborough, with evidence from the late Woodland Period from 1000 to 1600 AD. They include a reconstruction of an Occaneechi Village from 300 years ago. Watch the calendar for Pow Wows in North Carolina, find out what to expect and become familiar with the appropriate etiquette if it’s your first one. There are many ways to honor and celebrate Native Americans at Duke.
