AMARYLLIS FLOWERS PICTURES

In 1788 a large part of what is today western New York State came into European hands through the Phelps and Gorham Treaty with the Five Nation Iroquois Indian Alliance (which had been established around 1450). A small tract of land procured from the Senecas was given to a former ‘Tory’ soldier, Ebenezer Allan (or Allen), who became known as ‘Indian’ Allan because of his close relationship to the native Americans. Allan established a grist mill on the Genesee River, which is the origin of the city of Rochester.
The pictured ceramic sculpture is by the well-known sculptor and artist Bill Stewart. Part of the reconstruction of the airport in the 1990s, it is called ‘The Council”, and it is connected closely to the renewed interest in the place of Native Americans in the history of the USA and in this case in particular of western New York State. Much of this history is unknown or undocumented, and a great deal of lore has developed. Hence perhaps the inscriptions of this intriguing sculpture are from rather far afield. Engraved in the black marble is an Inuit Hunting Song:

“In the very earliest time/ When both people and animals lived on earth/ A person could become an animal if he wanted to/ And an animal could become a human being/ Sometimes they were people/ and sometimes animals/ And there was no difference/ All spoke the same language.”

The second inscription is a quotation from an alleged letter of the famous Suquamish chief Seattle (or Sealth) (c.1786-1866) of what is now the state of Washington in 1855 to president Franklin Pierce (1804-1869):

“What are human beings without animals?/ If all the animals ceased to exist/ human beings would die of a great loneliness. For whatever happens to the animals / would happen soon also to human beings. All things connect.”

It is whispered that the animals of this sculpture in the dead of the night have been known to roam freely through the unpeopled airport. It is indeed abandoned in the late evening – as I saw last night – and these whisperings may well be true…

Rochester NY
Mt Hope Cemetery

In 1857 John Snell was the engineer of the locomotive Daniel Webster. He was killed while trying to stop the locomotive from crashing into seven iron bars that had been laid across the track. His heroic action saved the lives of the passengers and crew.