Break Dancing with Lewis and Clark on New Year’s Day 1805: Mandan Indian Villages, North Dakota

Head Spins: On New Year’s Day, January 1, 1805, Francois Rivet danced on his head for the Mandan Indians, who were their hosts for the winter. Rivet was one of the French boatmen who accompanied the expedition up river to the Mandan Villages and returned to St Louis with the keelboat in the spring. Sergeant John Ordway wrote in his journal:

Tuesday 1st Jany. 1805. cloudy but moderate. we fired a Swivel & drank a Glass. about 9 o.C. 15 of the party went up to the 1st village of Mandans to dance as it had been their request. carried with a fiddle & a Tambereen & a Sounden horn. as we arrived at the entrence of the vil. we fired one round then the music played. loaded again. then marched to the center of the vil. fired again. then commenced dancing. a frenchman* danced on his head and all danced round him for a Short time then went in to a lodge & danced a while, which pleased them verry much then they brought victules from different lodges & of different kinds of diet, they brought us also a quantity of corn & Some buffalow Robes which they made us a present off. So we danced in different lodges untill late in the afternoon. then a part of the men returned to the fort the remainder Stayed all night in the village—rained a little in the eve.

*Sgt.Ordway had noted in his journal on November 27 that Rivet danced on his head to entertain Indian visitors from the Hidatsa Village where Sacagawea and her husband Toussaint Charbonneau lived. (Volume 9, The Definitive Journals of Lewis and Clark: John Ordway and Charles Floyd)

This head dancing is now a popular dance move seen all around the world, called break dancing. Google has a collection of world record head spins on videotape. To see an Australian teenager perform a world record head spin, use the following link: http://video.google.com.au/videoplay?docid=246459498664593769

Black Indian Chief: William Clark and his servant York joined the party later in the day. He wrote:

I found them much pleased at the Danceing of our men. I ordered my black Servent to Dance which amused the Croud verry much, and Some what astonished them, that So large a man Should be active &c. &c.

A very interesting journal entry by Clark follows:

— just as I was about to return the 2nd Chief and the Black man, also a Chief returned from a mission on which they had been Sent to meet a large party 150 of Gros Ventres who were on their way down from their Camps 10 Miles above to revenge on the Shoe tribe an injurey which they had received by a Shoe man Steeling a Gross Venters Girl, those Chiefs gave the pipe turned party back, after Delivering up the girl, which the Shoe Chief had taken and given to them for that purpose. I returned in the evening, at night the party except 6 returned, with 3 robes, and 13 Strings of Corn, which the Indians had given them.

In my reading of his entry, I believe it clearly states that one of the Mandan chiefs was a black man.

(Volume 3, The Definitive Journals of Lewis and Clark: Up the Missouri to Fort Mandan)

Read for Yourself: The Online Journals are found at the University of Nebraska Press website. All six journal writers are conveniently grouped together by date of entry. Please visit the website of my book Lewis and Clark Road Trips  at  www.lewisandclarkroadtrips.com to order the paperback editions of the Journals. They are among the "Top 50 Lewis and Clark Books" available through the website’s Amazon Associate Bookstore.

Posted by on 12/31/2006 at 01:40 PM

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