Native American warrior statue unveiled in Southern Illinois

EQUALITY, Ill. -- The Shawnee warrior Tecumseh now stands sentry at the start of a trail near the Shawnee National Forest, and the 300 people who gathered Friday to see the bronze statue unveiled didn't seem to mind that the leader probably never set foot in the area.

Organizers raised the $60,000 needed for the life-sized statue to honor a great man whose people, the Shawnee, once lived in southern Illinois, said Bill Ghent, head of a local economic-development group. Most of the money came from state grants.

And it wouldn't hurt to attract more tourists to the area, either.

"We've got to have something unique that brings (tourists) here," said Ghent. "So we thought of the American Indian, and the one person who wanted to bring them together was Tecumseh," he said. "It was good that he was Shawnee, too."

Tecumseh was born in eastern Ohio in the late 18th century, and traveled throughout what is now the Midwest trying to unite disparate tribes in opposition to white settlers.

No single American Indian tribe has specific links to far southeastern Illinois, said Professor Frederick Hoxie, who teaches Native American history at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

The settlement Tecumseh founded was near what is now Lafayette, Ind., and he died in Canada during the War of 1812.

But the lush woods of far southeastern Illinois, near the Indiana border, was among the lands he considered "his home, the territory he cherished and loved," said Tehi Secondine, 72, of Tulsa, Okla., a descendant of Tecumseh who attended Friday's ceremony.

Although Tecumseh never lived here, "there were so many places he passed through it feels like a fitting place," Secondine said.

Secondine's whispered benediction hushed the crowd of local residents and other American Indians, who were in town for a weekend powwow at Southeastern Illinois College.

Six American Indian men sang a victory song and pounded a drum during the ceremony, held in a quiet clearing around the art work.

"This helps us reclaim our ancestor," Secondine said.