Nov. 13 speech at the Matheson History Museum will discuss history of indigenous people in the area
BY BENJAMIN MCLEISH, Alachua Chronicle Contributor
GAINESVILLE, Fla. – Nicole Nesberg will be discussing the history of indigenous people who lived in Alachua County and northern Florida at the Matheson History Museum on November 13. The museum is welcoming her to speak as a celebration for Native American Heritage Month.
Nesberg said the speech will begin with an indigenous protocol greeting that will explain where she is from, the people she comes from, the clan she comes from, and where she lives now. She will then include a land acknowledgment that recognizes the indigenous people who came before us.
Nesberg said she likes to start her speeches with a joke about the well-known Spaniard Ponce de León, who was killed by the indigenous people of Florida after he tried to colonize them. Nesberg describes this event as his “welcome to Florida” moment.
In her speech, Nesberg plans to explain that Native American history started with their contact with Europeans because of the indigenous people’s lack of a written language. Many indigenous people only have shards of pottery or ancient tools to explain their history before European contact, and written documentation made it easier to hypothesize how the indigenous people lived.
Nesberg’s speech will summarize the long history of Native American tribes in northern Florida. One of the tribes that is important to Florida’s history is the Timucua tribe; Nesberg said that in less than 250 years, the Timucua tribe lost nearly 200,000 people due to European colonization.
Nesberg is a history professor at Santa Fe College who is from Michigan and is part of the Sioux tribe of Chippewa Indians. She moved to Florida after getting her second Master’s Degree, which she obtained from Eastern Michigan University.
Nesberg teaches U.S. History and African American History, and all of her classes begin with a nod towards the history of indigenous people in America. She said that she is able to do that in a much more personable way than other instructors can.
Nesberg started to get involved in the Gainesville community when she noticed the gap in Native American history in northern Florida. During Gainesville’s 150th year anniversary, she realized that the city of Gainesville didn’t recognize the indigenous people who lived before the city was founded. However, she said that Gainesville is improving. There is now a plaque in front of City Hall that acknowledges the indigenous people who lived there.
This speech is just one step towards providing people with information that they may not have known about indigenous people, Nesberg said, adding that many organizations in Gainesville are starting to recognize the thousands of years of history that came before the founding of the city.
Nesberg said she’s happy to watch the public support of Native American Heritage month grow every year. Local groups, businesses, and colleges are coming together to highlight a group of people that haven’t always had the ability to be showcased.
“As a historian, we always have to keep in mind that this tapestry is woven with so many people,” Nesberg said, adding that American history is made up of countless cultures, events, and accomplishments.
This is the first time Nicole Nesberg is speaking at the Matheson History Museum, according to Kaitlyn Hof-Mahoney, the museum’s executive director, but she and Nesberg have worked together on multiple projects on the Alachua County Historical Commission. Hof-Mahoney said that the museum’s audience has consistently requested events related to Native American history, so she is excited to have Nesberg share her extensive knowledge of indigenous people with the museum’s visitors.
The Matheson History Museum also has permanent exhibits highlighting Native American history, such as a preserved 1,500-year-old canoe. Hof-Mahoney wants listeners of the speech to know that there is a rich Native history in Alachua county and that Native American history is essential to the history of this area.
What are the odds that, like Liz Warren and so many other fakirs, she’s 1/1024’th native american at most? To quote PT Barnum, there’s a . . . yuhknow . . . born every minute.
She teaches history and shares personal stories. Sad to see such an ugly post.
Please don’t be obtuse. She weaponizes the ideal of the noble savage to justify her biological disposition, that of a communist. Nothing more.
Who hacked the Alachua Chronicle’s website and posted a super-woke “indigenous people” article promoting a D-list “academic”? The “indigenous people” of Florida didn’t build a wall, so they lost their land to outsiders. Lesson learned! #Trump2024 #buildthatwall
OVER 400 YEARS AGO, WAS SHE THERE? The indigenous people lost the fight, they should not be able to write the historical story. And where did they come from? Aren’t they the Immigrants from the land bridge between Asia and North America! Otherwise put Ole Joe back downtown. The Democratic Party backed slavery and were slave owners, both northern Dems and southern dixiecrats. they lost the war to Republicans who where not slave owners. BS. Furthermore it was the Spaniards who committed the atrocities not todays residents of these United States.
I am absolutely disgusted by these comments! The indigenous people of America are NOT a conquered people. They are a Sovereign Nation that established treaties with our government (most of which were and are repeatedly broken).
Edjumikate your ignorant selves. Shame on you. Trail of Tears, Wounded Knee, Mankato MN massacre, the list goes on and on. Had they been a conquered people and simply assimilated into society, maybe your ignorance would make sense…but they are not and never were.
There’s a good chance we’d be speaking German right now if not for the Navajo peoples. If you don’t know what I’m referring to, again, educate yourselves. Sad, sad little men.
To claim Natives have not been conquered is delusional. They’ve been thoroughly pacified and domesticated; at best, turned into Economic Red Man. The Natives worthy of a venerable reputation died fighting, the rest became slaves.
I hope they can rediscover the qualities that made them noble and re-savage themselves
I think it should be indigenous peoples instead of people. The event is at 2 PM and while free, you have to pre-register online. The fact that we have no monuments for the native peoples that we killed off and replaced speaks to the low white trash caliber of the so-called white elitists here. Ward is an appropriate mayor, unfortunately.