LITR 4231 Early American Literature Sample Research Posts 2014 (research post assignment) Research Post 2

Elizabeth Sorensen

Quanah Parker

          Son of Peta Nocona and Cynthia Ann Parker, Quanah Parker was born in 1845 on Elk Creek in Oklahoma (Hosmer, 2010). During his early childhood, Quanah’s tribe was attacked by Texas Rangers, leading to his mother’s capture and his father’s death. This event left him an orphan, so he sought out refuge with the Quahada Comanches of the Llano Estacado (Hosmer, 2010).

During his time with the Quhada Comanches, Quanah “became an accomplished horseman and gradually proved himself to be an able leader” (Hosmer, 2010). His new tribe refused to move to a reservation as per the Medicine Lodge Treaty and as a result they became fugitives on the Staked Plains. This is where the tribe hunted buffalo and raided settlements for the next few years until the buffalo soldiers began decimating their only form of subsistence (Hosmer, 2010). Determined to maintain their independence, the Quahada, under the guidance of Quanah, formed a multitribal alliance with the Cheyennes, Arapahoes, Kiowas, and Comanches. This group was dedicated to expelling the hunters from the plains (Hosmer, 2010). The band of 700 Indians attacked the twenty-eight buffalo soldiers at Adobe Walls, resulting in disaster for the allied Indians. After the devastation, the alliance ended and the Quahada Comanches were forced to surrender their independence and move to the Kiowa-Comanche reservation in southern Oklahoma.

          Adjustment to reservation life was incredibly difficult for most Indians; however, Quanah made the transition with such ease that federal agents “seeking a way to unite the various Comanche bands, named him chief” (Hosmer, 2010) and the tribes agreed to this action. Parker was an assimilationist, so he strongly supported cooperation with whites. He strongly supported education, agriculture, and ranching on the reservation by communicating extensively with the government. Moreover, he served as a “judge on the tribal court, an innovation based on county tribunals; negotiated business agreements with white investors; and fought attempts to roll back the changes instituted under his direction” (Hosmer, 2010). Beyond this, Quanah approved the establishment of a Comanche police force which he believed would help the Indians manage their own affairs.

  Through shrewd investments in the Acme and Pacific Railway, Quanah Parker became a very wealthy man. As a testament to his successful conversion to white ways, “Parker was a close associate of several prominent Texas Panhandle ranchers, counted Theodore Roosevelt as one of his friends, and was frequently interviewed by magazine reporters on a variety of subjects, including political and social issues” (Hosmer, 2010). Despite this, Quanah did not completely forego his Indian culture nor did he force his followers to give up their beliefs. He kept all seven of his wives, refused to cut his braids, rejected Christianity, and was a part of the peyote-eating Native American Church.

Eventually, in 1901, the federal government voted to break up the Comanche-Kiowa reservation into individual holdings and open it to outside settlements.  For the remaining years of his life, “Parker operated his profitable ranch, continued to seek ties with whites, maintained his position as the most influential person among the now-dispersed Comanches, and was named deputy sheriff of Lawton, Oklahoma by his people in 1902" (Hosmer, 2010). On February 23, 1911, “Quanah Parker, the most famous chief of the Comanche Indians died in his home of pneumonia” (New York Times, 1911). His obituary states that “He possessed intelligence far above the members of his other tribe” and was “idolized by his people” (New York Times, 1911). At his funeral, Quanah was dressed in full Comanche regalia and was buried beside his mother, Cynthia Ann Parker, in Post Oak Mission cemetery in Oklahoma. In 1957 Quanah and Cynthia Ann Parker were reburied at Fort Sill Post Cemetery at Lawton, Oklahoma, due to the expansion of a missile base. On August 9, 1957, Quanah was buried with full military honors in a section of that cemetery now known as Chief's Knoll.  

Sources

Brian C. Hosmer, "PARKER, QUANAH," Handbook of Texas Online(http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fpa28), accessed April 28, 2014. Uploaded on June 15, 2010. Published by the Texas State Historical Association.

QUANAH PARKER DEAD. 1911. New York Times (1857-1922), Feb 24, 1911. http://search.proquest.com/docview/97180891?accountid=7108 (accessed April 28, 2014).