Texana-Wichita TB03

I maintain records on my trackables. For a US-based trackable, this one is unusual for its longevity and movement. In the six-year period, 2010-19, the owner released a total of 3,793 trackables in the United States (96%) and Europe (4%). This trackable is one of the 5% of the total that circulated for at least 5 years and had been moved at least 25 times. That is a target rate of at least five drops per year for five years, or a drop every 73 days. The average drop rate of my trackables in the US is 124 days, in Europe it is 71 days. As of 1-Apr-24 this trackable had survived for 8.9 years and had been moved by 31 cachers, for an average drop every 105 days, or 3.5 drops per year. Please keep it moving, then drop it in a safe place!

No permission is needed to leave the U.S. While in the U.S., please drop it at an event, in a Premium Member only OR a rural cache near a busy trail or road. Do not place it in an urban, non-premium cache. Transport the bug in the original plastic bag for as long as the bag lasts; the bag keeps the trackable clean and dry, protects the number and prevents tangling with other items. Otherwise, take the trackable anywhere you wish.

This travel bug is one of several commemorating the major Indian tribes native to the land of what is now Texas from historic times (in general from the 18^th century).  The term tribe applies to peoples who spoke the same language and and shared the same customs and rituals.  There are many other tribes and lesser-known bands occupying Texas than are acknowledged here.   Some of these were never large enough to be considered a major tribe, others ceased to exist before the 1700s (assimilation and disease), some these were driven into the region by European-American expanansion (Cherokee, Kickapoo, Tigua, Alabama, others), and finally some could not be classified because they were never seen by keen observers while their language and ways were still intact.  The Cohuiltecans of south Texas fit all these criteria.  It would be a mistake to assume that these tribes are insignificant in the history of Texas.  Below is a brief narrative of the presence of one major tribe from historic times.  Much of the information is from the online Texas Almanac.  

The Wichita tribe of Indians was one of several bands that composed the Wichita confederacy.  The Wichita called themselves Kitikiti'sh, meaning "raccoon eyes," because the designs of tattoos around the men's eyes resembled the eyes of the raccoon.  In central Kansas in 1541 the Coronado expedition visited Indians whom Coronado called Quiviras and who have been identified by archeological and historical studies as Wichitas.   By 1719 these people had moved south to Oklahoma and were called Ousitas by the French trader Jean Baptiste Bénard de La Harpe.  From the 1750s to 1810 one band of the Wichita Indians was on the Red River north of the site of present Nocona, Texas.  The Wichitas, during this period, were prominent middlemen in the trade between the Comanches on the plains and Louisiana merchants and were at the zenith of their power and prestige.  Warriors of the band accompanied the Comanches in the attack on the Spanish Santa Cruz de San Sabá Mission in 1758. The Red River villages withstood a retaliatory strike by the Spanish in 1759.   In the period 1772 to 1805  bands of Wichitas were observed in the region between the Red River (Oklahoma-Texas border) and San Antonio.

For reasons not clearly understood, the Wichita declined after about 1810, although periodically thereafter until the 1850s villages of Wichita were located on the Wichita and Brazos rivers of Texas and the Wichita Mountains of Oklahoma, near present day Fort Sill.  A village near Rush Springs, Oklahoma,  was destroyed in 1858 by a United States military force pursuing hostile Comanches who were camped nearby.  Survivors joined remnants of other bands of the Wichita confederacy on the Washita River in 1859 and, when the Civil War broke out, fled with them to Kansas.  After the Civil War they were relocated to the Wichita Reservation near present Anadarko, Oklahoma.   In the 1990s the Wichita group still existed as a federally recognized governmental entity. Significant and continuing influence of the name Wichita is found in North Texas in the name of a river, the name of a county, and the name of a prominent city, Wichita Falls. Wichita, Kansas, owes its name to the early presence of the tribe in that area.

The Wichitas were dependent on both agriculture and hunting for subsistence.  They lived in villages of dome-shaped grass houses, farmed extensive fields of corn, tobacco, and melons along the streams where they made their homes, and left their villages for annual hunts during which time they cached their stores of agricultural goods in the ground along the banks of streams.  Slightly darker in color than other native people of Texas, the Wichitas were distinguished by their elaborate tattoos, the scalp-lock worn by the men, and the custom of the women to remain nude from the waist up.  They had little ritualistic religion, but were impressed by the natural forces around them and gave expression to them in an elaborate mythology.  Although warriors by tradition, the men, as well as women, tended to be friendly toward strangers, avoided confrontations unless provoked, and were noted for their hospitality. Their villages were landmarks on the southern plains, were well laid out, and were clearly distinguishable by their grass lodges and nearby fields.