Rebjane63 on Nostr: Credit: Cherokee Community (Facebook) A major piece of Monacan homeland is on track ...

Credit: Cherokee Community (Facebook)
A major piece of Monacan homeland is on track to return to Monacan stewardship.
Sweet Briar College has announced plans to sell the remaining 400 acres of Bear Mountain in Amherst County, Virginia, to the federally recognized Monacan Indian Nation. The Nation considers Bear Mountain sacred and central to its ancestral homeland. The transaction is being facilitated with The Conservation Fund and is expected to close in spring 2027.
Bear Mountain’s significance reaches back generations. In 1833, Monacan ancestor William Johns purchased 400 acres on the mountain, where a Monacan community later developed. At the base of the mountain stands the historic Bear Mountain Indian Mission School, an important surviving center of Monacan community history.
The Monacan Indian Nation already owns a portion of Bear Mountain, land recovered in the 1990s after decades of work to protect places tied to Monacan history and identity. Chief Diane Shields described the effort to acquire the last portion as “securing our history,” noting that the property was once held by Monacan people.
Sweet Briar College President Mary Pope Hutson said she believes the Monacan Nation should have ownership of the Bear Mountain tract, recognizing the Nation as the first peoples of the land where the college now stands. The college has also adopted a land acknowledgement and established a scholarship fund for Monacan women.
The Monacan people are among the oldest Indigenous communities still living in their ancestral homeland in Virginia, with historic ties across the Piedmont and Blue Ridge region.
How can institutions and communities better preserve Indigenous history connected to specific lands?
#IndigenousHistory #MonacanNation #VirginiaHistory #NativeAmerican
Sources: Monacan Indian Nation, Cardinal News, Virginia DCR, U.S. Congress