Songnote: The settlers took their land; the state took their name. The Kansa or Kaw Indians were allotted repeatedly smaller reservations until they were finally exiled from Kansas in 1873. In their last years here, they looked forward to interludes of freedom when they left the reservation to go west for annual buffalo hunts. I learned the facts for this song from writer Ron Parks, a former administrator at the wonderful Kaw Mission Historical Site in Council Grove, which continues to celebrate the heritage of the Kaw.
Lyrics:
On westward we go toward the last buffalo
To the high plains of sturdy short grass
Where the great southern herd’s still a sight beyond words
As it covers the prairie so vast
On to Plum Creek and Turkey Creek, Smoky Hill, too
Our ponies and families walk
To the campgrounds we know of our grandfathers’ ghosts
From the past glory days of the Kaw
We follow the trail – our ancestors’ trail
Over hillside and river and vale
Beside sunflowers high ‘neath an indigo sky
We’ll journey along the Kaw Trail
Our gardens are trampled by white squatters’ cows
We gave up our corn and our beans
While we hunt in the west they are stealing the rest
And we come back to places stripped clean
In the year that the whites call eighteen-fifty-five
Nearly one out of four of us died
The smallpox and hunger took loved ones away
Breaking hearts of the ones who survived Now … CHORUS
The trader he tries to divide us with lies
And turn some of us back on the others
But when we go west, we are back to our best
Where each Kaw is the other one’s brother So …CHORUS