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great plains great plains great plainsgreat plains

Distant Memories

faded recollections of a different era...

written in 2021
© Richard Coffey - All Rights Reserved

Distant Memories

Imagine a time when millions of buffalo roamed the vast empty prairies... The seemingly never-ending American grasslands stretched from southern Wisconsin to western Montana and from central Texas to Canada. Before 1850, between twenty and sixty million bison roamed the North American plains.

Sadly, United States' westward expansion and settlers' ardent belief in Manifest Destiny put an end to that era and by 1900, less than a thousand buffalo were still alive. For the many—who were displaced and discarded—all that is just a distant memory...


(click to expand/collapse)

“Our nation was born in genocide when it embraced the doctrine that the original American, the Indian, was an inferior race. Even before there were large numbers of Negroes on our shore, the scar of racial hatred had already disfigured colonial society. From the sixteenth century forward, blood flowed in battles over racial supremacy. We are perhaps the only nation which tried as a matter of national policy to wipe out its indigenous population. Moreover, we elevated that tragic experience into a noble crusade. Indeed, even today we have not permitted ourselves to reject or feel remorse for this shameful episode. Our literature, our films, our drama, our folklore all exalt it. Our children are still taught to respect the violence which reduced a red-skinned people of an earlier culture into a few fragmented groups herded into impoverished reservations.”
― Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

About the Music:

This soundscape's rhythm track is primarily propelled by an udu.1 The udu is actually Nigerian-- not Native American in origin. Its a lovely unique instrument---basically a clay water jug played by hand. Additional drums are added for a bit of extra depth and the flute is the low D minor Native American bass flute.

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1 - Sliced and diced from a Wikiloops track