Little Bighorn, Custer, Happy Meals and mighty warriors

In recent days, Diversity Inc. reported about a George Armstrong Custer toy that was put into McDonald’s Happy Meal boxes. A few Native people complained that it was insensitive. I was reminded of the Custer toy after reading a Billings Gazette story about all the activities at the Little Bighorn Battlefield scheduled for Thursday.

Here’s the lead to that story: “Northern Cheyenne Morning Star Riders will be up early Thursday to begin their return to Little Bighorn Battlefield, where together with their Lakota Sioux allies they wiped out five companies of the 7th Cavalry 133 years ago to the day.” As I read the lead, I thought that my Native brothers and sisters shouldn’t be upset about the Custer toy. Read the lead again. The Northern Cheyenne, Lakota and allies “wiped out five companies of the 7th Cavalry.” Custer died there at the battle of the Greasy Grass. On Sunday — the day of the summer solstice — I stopped to visit some friends in Northern Cheyenne as I made my way down to the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota to visit some of my Lakota relatives.

While at Northern Cheyenne, Phillip Whiteman Jr. and Lynette Two Bulls took a group of us out to the Deer Medicine Rocks, a sacred area that tells the story of Sitting Bull’s Sundance vision. It was the vision in which he saw soldiers falling upside down into a massive Indian camp. Sitting Bull shared his vision with all the warriors who had gathered for the Sundance. The chiefs and warriors were confident of victory against Custer.

On the other hand, Custer was warned by scouts about the battle he was destined to lose. He wouldn’t listen.

On Thursday, that battle will be re-enacted. As a Native person, I don’t care about about a McDonald’s toy with a plastic Custer doll inside. It seems trivial compared to the immense power of Sitting Bull’s vision, a power that came through prayer and ceremony. His vision is a reminder of all the Sundances taking place around Indian Country this summer. It is a reminder that we Native people are still powerful.

I would have been more offended if McDonald’s had put Sitting Bull in a cheap, fast food Happy Meal.

Jodi Rave