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| Village votes to keep seal depicting white founder fighting Native American | Village votes to keep seal depicting white founder fighting Native American |
| (about 5 hours later) | |
| A village in upstate New York has overwhelmingly voted in favor of keeping an emblem showing a white man in combat with a Native American that has perturbed outsiders for decades. | A village in upstate New York has overwhelmingly voted in favor of keeping an emblem showing a white man in combat with a Native American that has perturbed outsiders for decades. |
| In a non-binding vote conducted on Monday night, residents of the village of Whitesboro voted 157-55 in support of keeping a seal that, depending on your perspective, either depicts village founder Hugh White strangling a member of the Oneida Indian nation or, as the town’s historical society claims, depicts a friendly wrestling match that helped foster good relations between White and the Oneida tribe. | |
| “Whitesboro views this seal as a moment in time when good relations were fostered,” village clerk Dana Nimey-Olney told the Guardian. “It’s not a controversy within the village; it never has been a controversy within the village.” | |
| The current iteration of the seal, which appears on village stationery and police vehicles, is based on a model that “goes back to the 1800s”, according to Nimey-Olney. The modern example was originally designed by a local artist in 1963 in celebration of Whitesboro’s sesquicentennial. The seal has faced cyclical tempests of criticism since the 1970s, when a notice filed with the village board called attention to the close resemblance of White’s wrestling maneuver to strangulation. | |
| It’s a seal that takes a little explaining | It’s a seal that takes a little explaining |
| “The hands of Hugh White were moved farther down on the Native American’s body to make it look like it was more on his shoulders than on his neck” in response to the notice, said Nimey-Olney, but four decades later, that still may appear too close for comfort for outsiders. | “The hands of Hugh White were moved farther down on the Native American’s body to make it look like it was more on his shoulders than on his neck” in response to the notice, said Nimey-Olney, but four decades later, that still may appear too close for comfort for outsiders. |
| As former mayor Richard Pugh put it: “It’s a seal that takes a little explaining.” | As former mayor Richard Pugh put it: “It’s a seal that takes a little explaining.” |
| According to village historian Judy Mallozzi, who documents Whitesboro’s history on the village’s website, the seal depicts nothing more than an amiable bout of horseplay between the chief of the Oneida tribe and White, who reputedly became New York’s first white inhabitant west of the Mohawk river in 1784. | According to village historian Judy Mallozzi, who documents Whitesboro’s history on the village’s website, the seal depicts nothing more than an amiable bout of horseplay between the chief of the Oneida tribe and White, who reputedly became New York’s first white inhabitant west of the Mohawk river in 1784. |
| After being challenged to a wrestling match by the chief, White, who “dared not risk being browbeaten by an Indian nor did he want to be called a coward”, accepted the challenge and immediately felled his opponent. After the chief, who purportedly said, “You good fellow too much,” declared White the victor, he “became a hero in the eyes of the Oneida Indians”. | |
| Related: Racist public symbols in the US go far beyond the Confederate flag | |
| The veracity of the story, which also notes that White was “required to exercise much diplomacy in dealing with his red neighbors”, may be beyond verification. But according to Nimey-Olney, who is not a resident of the village of Whitesboro and could not vote in Monday’s poll, the citizens of a village that was once only famous as the hometown of Philadelphia Flyers goalie Robert Esche do not see the seal as anything other than a reminder of a period when the area’s residents were in racial harmony. | The veracity of the story, which also notes that White was “required to exercise much diplomacy in dealing with his red neighbors”, may be beyond verification. But according to Nimey-Olney, who is not a resident of the village of Whitesboro and could not vote in Monday’s poll, the citizens of a village that was once only famous as the hometown of Philadelphia Flyers goalie Robert Esche do not see the seal as anything other than a reminder of a period when the area’s residents were in racial harmony. |
| “Everybody keeps talking about it being a choking incident,” said Nimey-Olney. “I don’t know if they think that the wrestling story is something new, something that came about after this seal was drawn, but the wrestling story does go back to the founding of the village. We’ve always looked at it as a positive event in the area’s history, because it’s when the residents and the local tribe began having a positive relationship. | “Everybody keeps talking about it being a choking incident,” said Nimey-Olney. “I don’t know if they think that the wrestling story is something new, something that came about after this seal was drawn, but the wrestling story does go back to the founding of the village. We’ve always looked at it as a positive event in the area’s history, because it’s when the residents and the local tribe began having a positive relationship. |
| “It’s sad that people who don’t know the history have come in and labelled it something bad.” |
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