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This community includes brochures, documents, and photos of the different buildings and facilities on the Kalamazoo College campus, including those which no longer exist.

LAND ACKNOWLEDGMENT We gather on the land of the Council of the Three Fires – the Ojibwe, the Odawa, and the Potawatomi. Indigenous nations of the Great Lakes region are also known as the Anishinaabe (Ah-nish-nah-bay), or original people, and their language is Anishinaabemowin (Ah-nish-nah-bay-mow-in).

“Kalamazoo” itself is derived from the Anishinaabe word meaning to surround with smoke, and reflects the way the mist rises off the Kalamazoo River. Kalamazoo College rests on Potawatomi land – specifically, on the traditional land of Match-e-be-nash-she-wish and his people.

The United States began seeking land cessions in Michigan after the defeat of the British and their Anishinaabe allies in the War of 1812. Southwest Michigan was ceded in the 1821 Treaty of Chicago with small tracts of land reserved at the sites of prominent Potawatomi villages, including a three-mile square area for Match-e-be-nash-she-wish in present-day Kalamazoo. Under the 1827 Treaty of St. Joseph, the U.S. government did away with four of the five reserved areas, including the one in Kalamazoo, in an attempt to consolidate the Potawatomi as a precursor to removal west. Although many Potawatomi were forcibly removed in 1840, some bands found ways to remain, including the Match-e-be-nash-she-wish band. Their descendants belong to the sovereign nation known as the Gun Lake Tribe. The Tribe has never been compensated for the loss of their Kalamazoo reserve.

We acknowledge the enduring relationship that exists between the People of the Three Fires and this land.

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