Online petitions seek to change, save Jackson 'Indian' mascot

A campaign to abolish the Jackson School District’s “Indian” mascot has been endorsed by thousands of online petition signers.

Meanwhile, a second online campaign is underway to “Save the name, save the mascot.”

According to the initial petition, created Friday by Jackson resident Beck Hamilton and Hamilton’s friend, Kyra Pearl, “Native Americans are people who have suffered great injustice at the hands of white people for centuries and deserve more than to be used as a school mascot.”

Hamilton grew up in Cape Girardeau and graduated from Cape Girardeau Central High School, while Pearl is an alumna of Jackson High School. She lived in the Jackson area until 2018 when she enlisted in the U.S. Army and is currently stationed at Fort Hood, Texas.

“I’ve always felt it was inappropriate that Jackson High School portrayed and encouraged so many negative stereotypes regarding their mascot,” Hamilton said. “The concern is centered around the need for the school district to take into consideration the students growing up in our community. The current mascot teaches our youth that it is appropriate to stereotype a person based on their race.”

Although they have not discussed their concerns about the mascot directly with Jackson School District representatives, Hamilton and Pearl said they plan to formally present the petition to the district board.

Initially, Hamilton and Pearl hoped their online petition would be signed by 3,000 like-minded people. As of Wednesday night, almost 15,000 people had endorsed the petition.

“We did not expect such a sudden influx of signatures so quickly,” Hamilton said. “The number rose from hundreds to thousands almost overnight and that was quite a surprise.”

Early signers of the petition were mostly from the immediate Jackson area.

“Most signatures we’ve received are from current and past students, faculty and family members from the Jackson and Cape Girardeau area,” Hamilton said. “Those supporters then spread the word by sharing the petition to their peer groups across the states.”

The petition is also receiving international support, which, according to Hamilton, is because it has been shared through social media and has been seen by people in dozens of countries, many of whom have ties to Missouri and are familiar with Jackson.

Several petition supporters added comments to the online document. One supporter, identified as “Anika H.” from Missouri, wrote, “My grandmother is Cherokee and has never been for the Jackson mascot nor the use of the spear as she finds it disrespectful.”

She continued, saying, “I have seen my grandmother cry because kids found it ‘funny’ to put on war paint and mock the Indian heritage without knowing anything about what war paint signifies. My grandmother has even said many times they could use ‘Warriors’ instead, which would symbolize strength and a fighter, but not an Indian.”

Second petition opposes first

Over the weekend, a second petition was posted online, this one in opposition to the petition to change the mascot.

The “anti-change” petition was started by Nickie Farrar of Jackson, who describes herself as a Jackson graduate with an American Indian heritage.

“Seems like everything is being deemed ‘racial injustice’ right now,” Farrar wrote in the introduction to her online petition.

“As a member of this community, (a) Jackson alumni and someone who is 1/2 Native American, this name ‘Indian,’ is not a racist word,” she wrote. “It’s a historic word and represents honor, pride, strength and resilience. This name is my history and I am proud of it and I’m proud to be a Jackson Indian.”

By late Wednesday night, the petition to keep the mascot had accumulated more than 2,000 online signatures. Farrar said she believes the petition to change the mascot has more signatures than hers because the internet platform it’s posted on has a wider reach than the one she used.

District is listening

Jackson School District superintendent John Link said the district recently became aware of both petitions. On Monday night, he received an email thanking him for signing the “save the mascot” petition, even though he did not and said it’s possible someone put his name and email address on the petition.

“Obviously, I have not taken a position for the mere point I need to be unbiased as we continue to look into this matter,” he said.

Link’s email address was included on both petitions. As a result, he said he has received “passionate responses on both sides.”

According to Link, Jackson’s sports teams have been known as “Indians” since 1923, when the district’s colors were changed from purple and white to red and black.

“It (the Indian nickname) was and has always been viewed as a name that represents strength, courage, hard work, remarkable spirit and great pride,” Link said.

“Student and community voice is important to us (and) we will continue to listen” he said. “Over the last few months, we have been working with school administrators to put together student focus groups for the 2020-2021 school year to talk about issues that face students and school culture.”

The question of whether to keep or change the mascot could be one of those issues.

“As you know, our recent focus has been to do everything we can to take care of students and their basic needs during the (COVID-19) pandemic,” he said.

“Not to diminish this issue, but for the past four months, our priority has included serving over 104,000 meals as well as getting plans ready to safely reopen school in August,” he said. “Our district has been working on how to safely get our students into the classroom because we know they rely on us for social-emotional support, nutritional needs as well as education.”

Elsewhere

At least two other schools in Southeast Missouri — St. Vincent High School in Perryville and Puxico High School — have “Indian” mascots.

“We’ve been ‘Indians’ as long as I can remember,” said Bruce Valleroy, a 1981 graduate of St. Vincent who has been the school’s athletic director 27 years.

“At our school, we have a lot of tradition with families,” Valleroy added. “Moms and Dads and grandparents and great-grandparents have gone to this school, and we’re all very proud to be Indians.”

The key, Valleroy said, is to be “very, very respectful” of the way Indians are portrayed. “At one time, our girls’ teams were known as ‘Squaws,’ but we changed that to ‘Lady Indians’ around 20 years ago.”

Southeast Missouri State University changed the names of its men’s and women’s athletic teams from “Indians” and “Otahkians” to “Redhawks” in 2004.

The petition to removed the Indian mascot may be found at www.thepetitionsite.com/736/119/579/change-the-mascot-of-jackson-r-2-school-district-from-%E2%80%9Cindians%E2%80%9D/.

The petition to keep the Indian mascot may be found at http://secure.avaaz.org/community_petitions/en/jackson_school_board_save_the_history_of_jackson_missouri_home_of_the_indians_/?fMvTXqb&fbogname=Erin&utm_source=sharetools&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=petition-1062497-save_the_history_of_jackson_missouri_home_of_the_indians_&utm_term=MvTXqb%2Ben.

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