Braves Field Way: Boston Braves Baseball and Football Teams and the History of Native Mascots

At this site, you will watch a video describing Native perspectives of Native mascots, which essentially started in the city of Boston with the creation of the Boston Braves baseball and football teams. When you arrive at the site of the old Braves Field (now Boston University's Nickerson Field), think about the following questions. Why would sports franchises owned by white people choose Native mascots? What does that tell us about how settler-colonialism operates well beyond intiail contact between Native people and settlers?

Next, here is an image of Braves Field, so you can draw comparisons to the present-day stadium. Feel free to walk around the site and explore the place. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Braves#/media/File:Fenway-park-1914-world-series.jpg

Next, you can read more below about the history of Native mascots and efforts to prevent their usage.

As discussed in the video, it was in 1941 that the Boston Braves created the racist characture of Chief Nakahoma (which also relates to the "tomahawk chop" done at games). Something that the Milwaukee and Atlanta Braves continued. As recently as 2013, the Atlanta Braves attempted to depict the mascot on their uniforms: https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Daily/Issues/2013/01/04/Franchises/Braves.aspx

National Congress of American Indians statement on Native mascots: https://www.ncai.org/proudtobe

Finally, there are over 20 teams in Massachusetts public schools that still use a Native mascot and the Massachusetts Indigenous Agenda is encourging all citizens to support legislation to ban the practice in this state: http://maindigenousagenda.org/native-mascots/