Black History Program to Go on Despite Protest

Bowers Museum officials said Friday that they will not change a program planned for later this month about African American soldiers who fought Indians, despite a protest and hunger strike by a Newport Beach Cherokee.

Six members of the African Cultural Arts Council, which is sponsoring the program, and a spokesman for Bowers met Thursday night at the Santa Ana museum with August Spivey, 53, of Newport Beach, who argued that the program should present the battles as a “dark spot” in history.

“I think it’s important that people be accountable for what they have done,” Spivey said. “There has to be a change here.”

Council members said they empathize with his position but insisted the two-hour Buffalo Soldier program, scheduled for Feb. 16, should not be targeted for a protest.

“This body of people can’t wipe the slate clean for you,” said Willia Edmonds, president of the council and organizer of the event. “I can’t apologize for what happened then. I can say it was a travesty and can instill in our children the right thing to do. That is the best thing I can offer.”

In the late 1800s, the all-black 9th and 10th Calvary earned the name Buffalo Soldiers while battling American Indians in the West.

Though Spivey claimed to be representing Native Americans, he ordered members of the American Indian Movement out of the meeting, claiming it was his “gig.”

Before that happened, Bowers officials invited the American Indian Movement to become an affiliate of the museum, like the African arts council, and to display Native American art and offer educational programs. AIM leaders said they could not afford the cost of becoming an affiliate but would like to be involved with the museum and offer programs.

Spivey’s protest was sparked by the Black History Parade last Saturday in Santa Ana.

“What are we telling our children if we allow people to parade down the street proud that they massacred our people?” Spivey asked. “It’s rubbing it in our faces.” Edmonds said that neither the council nor the museum was responsible for the parade.

The council said it would be willing to make a “general statement” at the beginning of the Buffalo Soldier program about the slain American Indians.

“Our mission is to bring diversity together,” Edmonds said. “This is not glorification. This is history.”