Ope-chan-canough 

The First American War Hero and Martyr

A renewed 2025 article © by Michael Auld, (anansistories.com)

Older blogs:  http://yamaye-mike.blogspot.com/

Above: A proposed monument to Opichancanough in which his likeness is represented by one of his Pamunkey tribal descendants, a 1930-1960's Washington, DC businessman and father of 21 children.

  "He began in 1610 what the American Revolutionaries achieved in 1776"

It would seem that the man known as the War Chief, brother of Wahunsenachawh or "Powhatan" (a title meaning Principal Dreamer") and his successor as Werowance (leader), should be the first Native American to be called a hero and given those deserved rights and privileges, like the Civil Rights heroine, Rosa Parks.

Opechancanough was the architect of the First Anglo-Powhatan War that took place from 1610-13 in Virginia. Never one to claim defeat as long as he lived, he rebounded with the Second Anglo-Powhatan War that took place from 1622-32. "In 1622 the English knew they were at war. On March 22 there was a massive [coordinated] assault on the English plantations on the James River. English trading vessels in the York River basin, and perhaps the Rappahannock area, were also attacked. About one-fourth of the English living in Virginia on that day; at least another fourth died within the year from Indian sniping, from the famine caused by English inability to plant crops under Indian fire."-- Powhatan Foreign Relations: 1500 - 1722, Edited by Helen C. Rountree, Pp. 190.

 

During the Third Anglo-Powhatan War (1644-46), Opechancanough was taken to the battlefront on a litter He was later captured and martyred when shot in the back by an English colonist while imprisoned.

His descendants are Still Here!

Some of Opechancanough's Descendants

Above: A few photographs of some of many hundreds of Opichancanough's descendants participating in some continuing activities: 

From powwows at young ages; To President Clinton's Washington, DC parade; Acting in movies; An official photo of Keziah Boston who, after over three hundred years, was an elected chief of the Tauxenent/Dogue; of Northern Virginia and Washington, DC ;  Photo of Rose Powhatan (Pamunkey/Tauxenent) an Assistant to the Tauxenent Chief who stands next to an exhibition banner in an art show in which she exhibited a traditional totem honoring her "Firewoman Warrior" ancestor Keziah Powhatan, a werowansquaw (female leader) who along with her  warriors in 1752 (See DAR plaque at Tysons Corner, VA) burned down the Fairfax County Courthouse when King Charles II gave her land to his cousin, Lord Fairfax); commemoration of the 1647 Treaty of Middle Plantation (Williamsburg) annually held at the Governor of Virginia's Mansion where, in this case, a deer represents the agreement that game be given to the Governor as a part of the treaty agreement with the British. The event continues yearly now for over 400 years, often instead of braver pelts, it is with a deer (or wild turkey) presented to the current governor. (The venison or wild turkey is donated to a shelter for a Thanksgiving dinner).

Above: The 16477 Treaty of Middle Plantation (Williamsburg, Virginia) as illustrated on a T-shirt by the author, from the Pamunkey Reservation's women potters designs made and fired from the Pamunkey River's red clay deposits.

 It reads: 

[Line 1]." *At the time of the flying of the geese (just before Thanksgiving), *Indian men, *travel,

[Line 2] *Across the water, * To meet with the Governor, * And to agree.

[Line 3] To smoke the Pipes of Peace. * Give firs, * And remain at. Peace, * Forever."

In reality, the territorial and cultural histories of the United States of America began at Jamestown, Virginia in 1607, with the establishment of the first successful permanent English settlement in North America. The American Revolution and Opechancanough's Wars share a similar quest, to rid the fledgling country of the English. The people who became "Americans" (through acculturation) were distinct from the English and had done so by first "going Native" and surviving off Powhatan II's generosity. During those early years, the English survived by trading or stealing Powhatan corn since they did not grow enough crops to feed themselves. The English were more interested in growing "brown gold" (tobacco) which was traded overseas as a major cash crop. Pocahontas' second husband, John Rolfe, previously had introduced a milder Taino tobacco to the American colony. The indigenous Caribbean Amerindian cash crop helped to finance the American Revolution. Americans became distinct from their colonial master, the English, by adopting Native American lifestyles and customs. For example, "historians, including Donald Grinde of the University at Buffalo, The State University of New York, have claimed that the democratic ideals of the Gayanashagowa [the Great Law of Peace of the Iroquois] provided a significant inspiration to Benjamin Franklin, James Madison and other framers of the United States Constitution"--http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Iroquois_Constitution.). It seems fitting that the first hero of this pivotal founding of a country was the Native American, and a man named Opechcancanough (pronounced in English as Opi-can-canoe).

(Top): !980's photograph of Powhatan's Mantle viewed by Rose Powhatan (Pamunkey/Tauxenent). (Bottom): Photo of the mantle showing a man between his two totems, a mountain lion and a deer. Surrounding them are circles representing 32-34 Algonquian nations in the kingdom, approximately between 18,700 to 19,250 square miles.

We should make a commemorative statue to the American hero Opechancanough who was a  younger brother of  paramount chief Wahunsenacawh  (Powhatan II, the statesman who expanded the confederation of 8 Algonquian nations into one of 34 before he was 60 years old). As seen above, Opechancanough was  primarily known as the  nationalist war chief who masterminded the inter-tribal Indian rebellion  of 1622, and later 1644, until he was assassinated (shot in the back) while held in captivity by  the English colonists in  Virginia in 1646. There are many theories about the true identity of Opechancanough as well as his rationale for instigating the ingeniously coordinated Virginia Indian rebellions. 

Some believe that Opechancanough may have been the captured Indian youth, initially taken to Mexico, where he was baptized and given the name "Don Luís" and educated by the Dominicans. He was later taken to Spain. During his two years in Spain, he met King Phillip II. While he was in Spain, he was generally assumed to be "the son of a petty Chief". He eventually left Spain for Havana, Cuba, in the company of Dominican missionaries. Don Luis carried on the Powhatan tradition of being a great speaker, and seems to have mastered the art of persuasion. He convinced the Dominicans to return with him to his homeland, under the pretense of helping them in their quest to "Christianize" his fellow tribesmen. Phillip II wanted to establish a missionary settlement in the Tidewater region of Virginia (then known as "Ajacan"). Some historians believe that Opechancanough was that unnamed captive, and his experiences among the Spanish may have influenced his deep distrust of European settlers in the "New World". He must have known that their plans for colonization would result in the cultural annihilation and displacement of his people by the Europeans.

 Another theory about Opechancanough's distrust of Europeans can be found in the writing of John Smith. Smith boasted of having shamed the well-respected leader by holding a pistol to his breast while marching him in front of his assembled tribesmen. Smith, as seen in his memoirs of the Pocahontas Story tended to exaggerate his power and stature. The Pamunkey warriors laid aside their weapons in an attempt to save the life of Opechancanough, not out of cowardice, but in solidarity of their love for him. Opechancanough was shown an egregious lack of respect by John Smith .

On Memorial Day and March 22nd, some Eastern Woodlands Native Americans, in the know, will quietly celebrate Opechancanough's strategic attempts to rid his territory of the increasing number of English interlopers.Why not join Virginia Natives by including in your meal for that day, turkey or venison (or any Virginia game animal, i.e. raccoon, muskrat, etc.), plus vegetarian succotash and corn bread or pone (two Powhatan Algonquian words). Or, as a learning assignment, you may want to practice a few of their following American words: 

"In addition to other current Algonquian dialects and dictionaries, the Powhatan's language is not dead. Algonquian is the language of the first indigenous Americans to intimately interact with the English. Their words below survive in the English language as Caucus -- from corcas. from caucauasu or "counselor". First recorded by Captain John Smith. Today, it is a political meeting, especially on Powhatan II's old territory where, according to an English chronicler, he liked to caucus with surrounding tribes (on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC) to make decisions. The chronicler also stated that 'Powhatan never left his territory'; Chipmunk -- from chitmunk. Hominy -- corn; Honk-- from honck or cohonk, a Canadian goose. It is associated with the sound made by the bird, or associated with winter or a year. The Powhatans called the "Potomac" River "the River of the Cohonks" for the noise made by the yearly arrival of the geese there. To honk, honky, and honky tonk all come from cohonk; Match coat -- from matchcores, skins or garment; Maypop -- from mahcawq, a vine with purple and white flowers that has an edible yellow fruit; Moccasin -- from mohkussin, a shoe; Muskrat -from mussascns; Opossum -- also possum, from aposoum, or "white beast"; Papoose -- an infant or young child; Pecan -- a nut, from paccan; Persimmon -- a fruit; Poke weed -- from pak, or pakon, blood + weed; Pone (Corn Pone) -- from apan, "baked". Powwow -- from pawwaw, an Algonquian medicine man. A dance ceremony used to  invoke divine aid in hunting, battle, or against disease. Now used as a Pan-Indian word for a social dance festival; Racoon -- from aroughcun; Susquehanna -- from suckahanna, water; Squaw -- a vagina, associated with a derogatory term for an Indian woman, now obsolete; Terrapin -- a turtle, from toolepeiwa; Tomahawk -- from tamahaac, tamohake, a weapon. From temah- (to cut off by tool) + aakan (a noun suffix); Tump (tump line) -- a strap or string hung across the forehead or chest to support a load carried on the back. -

Ticky-Ticky's QUEST

 Part 2 of a Trilogy: 

Travel to *Turtle Island

Copyright by Michael Auld 2024 

Book Cover: The hero Ticky-Ticky wearing his own shell georget necklace, and surrounded by other ancient spider clamshell gorgets which symbolize the power of the arachnid.

 

* a.k.a. The Native American name for North America because the continent looks like a giant turtle from above.

Author’s Note.

This free continuous story blog begins with a synopsis of each chapter of  Part 2 of the Ticky-Ticky story. Starting in National Native American Heritage Month, each week I will add the next chapter's synopsis until we arrive at the end of tis story. (To see Part 1, click here.)

INTRODUCTION

Spider Woman of the Hopi at the Creation. She is one of the people who Ticky-Ticky meets.

The history of spider women and men is ancient. For example, in the Americas the Hopi of New Mexico tell of Spider Woman who was present at the Creation. Her Web of Life connects all animate and inanimate things. Spider beings are in stories from Africa to Europe, and in the Americas. In Ghana and Jamaica it is Anansi. Europe has Aracnia, North America has even more. Here we have Grandmother Spider of the Cherokee, Spider Woman of the Hopi, Iktomi of the Lakota (Sioux), Spider Woman & her husband of the Dine or Navajo, Aunt Nancy of Georgia's Sea Islands, and Great Spider Mother of Teotihuakan, Mexico. Then,South America has a gigantic spider character in te Nasca desert. This story begins as Part 2 of a series in the trilogy of Kweku Anansi the Spider-Man's son, Ticky-Ticky.a quarter spider-boy searching the Americas for his missing wayward father. Ticky-Ticky's mom is a full-blood Yamaye Taino woman.

But,  first, here is the beginning of his journey whch starts in a Jamaican boy's school.
In Part 1, the young teen was forced to leave his Coromanti boys high school by the headmaster for inattention in class. "Don't come. back without your father," the British headmaster warned, instead of giving Ticky-Ticky a caning on the bent-over butt.
So, the spider-boy his was forced to go on a quest in search of Anansi, who had been missing for a year, while on an adventure of his own. This is a continuation of Ticky-Ticky's QUEST which take him to North Arica to meet ancient folkloric Native American spider people. So, come along for the ride!

Ticky-Ticky's search took him to Coabey, the Taino Island of the Dead. There he borrowed Opiel, the Searchdog of the Absent, and a flying, time traveling Bat-canoe. Next stop was HaitiHaiti You can see a synopsis of that story at http://anansistories.com/Ticky_Ticky.html.

PART 2 

CHAPTER 1

Ticky-Ticky's flying Bat-Canoe landed in the Florida Everglades, surprising John Littletree a Seminole who had recently encountered Anansi the Spider-Man's search for his "rich American relatives". Where did Ticky-Ticky's dad go?

  A happy feeling surged through Ticky-Ticky's heart in this first Native American encounter. We will see that he will receive a priceless lesson and a valuable lead about his father from a Seminole Indian, John Littletree. This is the time that Ticky-Ticky began to wear a spider gorget suspended around his neck. This amulet replaced the carved navel designed one from a manatee bone that had been given to him by Cuffy the Obeah-man, back in Jamaica. That navel amulet was supposed to serve Ticky-Ticky as a safety passport while he was in the ghost filled Caribbean’s Coabey, the Island of the Dead. That manatee bone amulet was ripped off his body when Guabancex, the Angry Woman of the Hurricane had snatched Ticky-Ticky from the flying Bat-canoe over Matinino, the Island of Women. The ancient spider gorget, carved from the purple and white quahog clamshell was a good luck charm, intended to smell out Spiders like Anansi and his Turtle Island relatives. 

Ticky-Ticky also learned from John that, "Amerindians of the Americas, outside of the U.S.A., were hot called Native Americans.” This term only applied to indigenous people of continental North America. In Canada, they are called First Nations. In Mexico, Indigina (In-dee-he-nah) and Indio (In-de-oh) were the words used. 

Ticky-Ticky had learned at Coromanti, his Jamaican High School, that Amerindian was a combined term that distinguished the indigenous people of the Americas from Asiatic Indians of India. The next lesson was from John Littletree. 

"Turtle Island was the indigenous name for the northern continent of the Americas." John had said. 

This was because, from the air, the North American continent appeared to be in the shape of a gigantic turtle. From ancient times, traditional maps were drawn by two-dimensional thinking sailors. Some Amerindians saw the world in 6-D. These six-“dimensions” we’re comprised of the Four Sacred Directions of the white, snowy North, the yellow of the warm South, the red of the East’s rising sun, and the black of the night and the West’s setting sun. The 5^th-Dimension was Father Sky above, populated by the winged ones. The 6^th Dimension was Mother Earth below, populated by the two and four legged, the crawlers and the swimmers. Sometimes there was the 7^th Dimension with which Ticky-Ticky was familiar; Opiyel’s Spirit World.

As one Maya shaman said, “The world is made up of dualities. As day need night, good cannot exist without evil…they balance each other.”

Author's Note_2: "I had met the late  John Littletree, a military veteran who was a dance circle's Arena Director at powwows in Virginia. I had to honor him in tis story."

To be continued..

 

Kamala Harris’ Jamaica

Kamala’s real Caribbean Heritage via Jamaican Artworks

Copyright 2024 by Michael Auld (Yamaye Taíno)

Much will be written about her because of her many firsts. But what about a different angle to Vice President, Kamala Harris’ Jamaican heritage? 

This article is by a Jamaican expat-artist and a fellow Howard University alumni.

Vice President, Kamala Harris backed by flags of her three heritages.-  Artwork by Jamaican-American artist, Michael Auld.

 

Vice President Kamala Harris, is of paternal Jamaican descent, and will soon become America's first woman multiethnic president. Christened with a Euro-Jamaican surname, she is fittingly, also tri-racial, a descendant of proud Jamaican, Asiatic Indian, and European ancestry. 

She said that she fell in love with Bob Marley early, and knew the lyrics to many of his songs. She was hooked on Jamaican pride. As a Jamaican myself, Africans from many countries burst into Bob’s songs when they find out I’m a “Yardie”, an affectionate term for the island.

Although her birth family is rooted in ancient cultures, as a Jamaican artist with similar genes, I present here aspects of her Jamaican roots, via my researched Yamayeka and African inspired artworks. My genetic background is Scottish, West African, and Indigenous Asiatic Amerindian, a.k.a. the island's Yamaye Taíno ancestors.

What is Kamala’s Jamaica?

 The island is a multicultural society whose name, "Jamaica" is derived from Yamayeka, the indigenous Yamaye Taíno culture whose presence in this Northern Caribbean territory, was via an early colonization by my Amerindian ancestors around 2,124 years ago, around the birth of Jesus the Christ of Palestine. The Taíno were originally an Orinoco Basin's river community who, because of a population explosion, and directed in an ancient mythology by the Supreme Being, Yaya, because of an infraction by his son, Yaya-el to, upon the pain of death, leave the homeland and never return. Following the god’s advise, they left the South American continent to become seafarers, traveling island by island, north up the chain of Caribbean Islands, into Florida, settling in the Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Cuba, the Dominican Republic & Haiti, and the western tip of Florida. Along the way to becoming empires, as was true of their Central and South American neighbors, they created cacigazos, or ruling cacike chiefdoms on each territory

They came from an Amerindian Continent familiar with many very ancient and technologically and agriculturally advanced pyramid and empire-building civilizations. For example, how do you turn a poisonous tuber like bitter yuca/cassava/manioc into a nourishing daily bread, or cross-pollinate a grass and invent life-giving majisi/maize/"corn". Via the invading Spanish and Portuguese, they introduced the world to over 60 items, including words like hurricane, sacred cojibi (a.k.a. “tobacco”), hammock, maize, sweet potatoes, aji (capsicum peppers), tapioca, key or cay, and much more words, technologies, and food items now commonly used by Eastern Hemisphere cultures. 

Jamaica's later 1665 arriving British Colonial clergy created our Coat of Arms which honors the Taíno. 

Jamaica’s Coat of Arms whose top was originally designed by a British Colonial cleric, William Sancroft who was then Archbishop of Canterbury. The "Out of Many, One People" epithet was added later for the island's Independence in 1962. It has a Yamaye Taíno couple, a Jamaican crocodile, a British herald’s crown with a St. Andrew cross and shield, with five endemic pineapples.

My proposed Hope Botanical Gardens monument about our Yamaye Taíno indigenous Amerindian heritage (if the Gardens can get the funding). The sculpted couple are standing on a map of the island, surrounded by endemic pineapple plants and a epithet of flowers. The  Taíno intermarried with the earlier Igneri people, who had migrated from the North (Florida) and the west from Central America (probably the Yucatan) during the Caribbean's Pristine Era.

Genetically, Vice President Kamala Harris, soon to become a US President, is half maternal Asiatic Indian with large percentages of paternal African and European admixtures, a fitting combination for the USA, her multiethnic country of birth. However, in the United States of America’s racist “*One Drop Rule” practice, her paternal Jamaican part African ancestry makes her 100% "Black" in America's eyes. So, what racial category does she belong? Via my artworks, here is an artistic breakdown of the Jamaican groups to which she is ethnically connected.

* That is , before the invention of DNA, in racist America,"One Drop" of strong Sub-Saharan "blood" makes a human being totally Black.

The Trilogy Protectors: As president, Kamala Harris will need my three Guardian Angels styled from Ethiopian angel images (implying Jamaican Ras Tafari's protection).

(L-R).Harriet Tubman (American Protecter holding her iconic gun); Ast or Isis (golden winged Mother of Femininity, holding her staff); and Marcus Garvey (Back-to-Africa proponent from Jamaica, holding a Sword of Justice) -- Welded bicycle rims, inlaid & painted Plexiglass etching, and photographs. 

The Peculiarity of "Race" in the Americas 

Above: An early Mexican painting of Racial divisions in Mexico 

Since VP Kamala Harris' race has become an issue to some Americans, here is one country of the Americas' take on race-mixing. The above painting is Mexican, and represents the Spanish attempt to introduce 16 varieties of racial mixing in this oldest European country in the Americas. Spain was accustomed in its Iberian homeland, to North African Moores (for 700 years), Jews, and white Christians already mixing there. With the added indigenous Amerindian's Anahuac of the Mexica (Me-she-ka) or "Aztec" Tripple Alliance Empire and other local nations, Sub-Saharan Africans, "white" Spanish, and hiding Converso Jews, hiding out from the Spanish Inquisition.

America’s racism has been used in art and now highlighted with Donald Trump in the 2024 Presidential race trying to rewrite a US historical racist agenda. In the past, he attacked Pequots for not being “Indian" enough when they were competitively applying for a casino in Connecticut. Kamala Harris was born enmeshed in American racial history and not in Jamaica's own classification of “Browning”, similar to South African “Colored” designation, as is peculiar to those countries. These are acknowledgments of race mixing. Not so in America, who does not have those racial categories, except "other". 

 

KAMALA's CARIBBEAN PEDIGREE:

 BY ART

She was born in Amerindian America with a bi-racial Jamaican father, and a South Indian mother. She got her light skin color from white British colonial progeny, one named Harris. I will start with my and Kamala's country of Yamayeka a.k.a. Jamaica.

However, to really know Kamala’s deepest island’s mythological background you would also have to see my blog on “Jamaica’s 7+ Storylines”, tales of a fire-snorting Devil-bull apparition called a Rolling Calf, a pirate turned privateer like Captain Henry Morgan, (a Welshman who also owned two slave plantations), a "twice buried" Frenchman, a victim of the Port Royal town-destroying earthquake, a White Witch of the Rose Hall Plantation, next to American Country Singer, Johnny Cash's estate.

Taíno Jamaica (Yamayeka)

My Taíno Creation Storybook. (Click to the YouTube link for my narrated 5-minute story).

My wall sculpture of Guabancex, Angry Woman Goddess, Rider of the Winds, whom the Taíno's Hurakan  (hura=wind,  ca’an = center, i.e. center of the wind) is known in English as a hurricane. To the Caribbean's Taíno she came yearly to blow down houses and trees, with two accomplices, GuatauBa! who is the herald thunder and lightening who announced her pending arrival. His twin brother is Coatrisque, the Deluge, who follows them. with floods of water cascading down the mountains. On the sculpture's hands are Taíno women's pottery image of a hurricane, as it was discovered centuries later by satellite photography, as "S" shaped.

Wood and shell sculpture of Ataberia, the Virgin Mother giving birth to Yucahu, the Taíno
God of the Sea and the life-saving yuca tuber.

Composite photo of Itiba Cahubaba our 5th Earth Mother, giving birth to the 4-Fathers of humankind. This concept implies that there were four Earth destructions. The son, Deminan, is the father of the Taíno, while his three brothers ("twins"), are not named.

A wall hummingbird sculpture of welded metal bicycle parts, etched and colored Plexiglass and an inlaid photo of Jamaica's first Prime Minister, Sir Alexander Bustamante. Jamaica's national bird is its endemic swallowtail hummingbird.

Taíno Epic: A print of "Guahayona's Travel to Matanino", the Island of Women. which enticed the Spanish arrivals in the Americas to search for La California, an island of Amazons, whose only metal was gold weapons. (Incorporated rubber ball-court images of Puerto Rican concept of Atabey, Goddess of Childbirth, and Fresh Waters, virgin mother of Yucahu, God of the Sea and the nourishing yuca/cassava tuber).

Next is Guahayona as he leaves Matinino and travels to its twin Island of Guanin (14k Gold). The Taíno used the hummingbird's metallic feathers as a symbol of gold. (incorporated woodcut image of Taínos panning for gold. A technique employed by arriving Europeans, called by them, "panning" for gold). 

The Taíno epic used by a 16th Century Spanish novelist who copied the Travels of Guahayona, the First Shaman, to create La California, a story of an island of Amazons. a Spanish tale taken down for Columbus, by Father Ramon Pane on Hispaniola (Ayti Bohio/Kiskeya), whose manuscript was sent to Spain. The ensuing story by 16th century Spanish novelist Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo, was from the Taíno's Guahayona Tale of the Island of Women, and its twin, the Island of Guanin/Gold. 

 Kamala’s African Heritage

Kamala Harris' African heritage in Jamaica, begins with my rendering of this Baga Creation Story sculptural images of a woman, a man and a snake figures. In the myth, the Earth's waters began as a calm item, whose vigorous movements of a primordial snake created movements of rivers and the sea. --Welded handlebars, and etched Plexiglass.

Ghana 

Ghanaian influences in Jamaica are the strongest manifestations of the island's African cultural retentions. This is especially true of the Asanti's Akan Anansi the Spider-Man, whose morality-based stories have been passed down and recorded through the centuries. Jamaicans would automatically dismissively say, "Cho man, yu a tell a Anansi Story!" (Meaning, "You are not telling the truth!"). 

Next comes the Maroons, led by escaped enslaved Asanti (Ashanti) sugarcane plantations escapees. They went to the mountains and formed gurilla bands, twice defeating the British, where they were welcomed by the Yamaye Taíno Cimarrones who had earlier removed themselves from Spanish ranches where they were forced to work and bring in the island's sparse gold reserves. 

Kamala’s childhood photos with her island cousins in Jamaica, reveal that she would have heard AnansiStories or (Anansesem in Ghana’s Twi language,). Anansi, imported from the Akan of Ghana, is a very deeply ingrained moral guide for all Jamaicans. (See my anansistories.com).

My Anansi the Spider (doll) with six of his seven Ghanaian children. Only his wife, Aso, (a.k.a. "Cookie") and his youngest son, Intikuma (Ticky-Ticky in my novel) came to Jamaica with him.

A panel from my Anansesem (AnansiStories) folkloric comic strip, whose stories were published by the Jamaican Gleaner Company's Star tabloid in the 1970s. This last, and unpublished story is about the island/s guerrilla fighter Maroons and the Yamaye Taíno who welcomed them and taught the escapees from plantation slavery, how to survive in the Jamaican forests. 

 

My Anansi and his back-up posse, Me, Myself, and I & I as condoms, all masked for both the Aids and the Corona Virus campaigns.

 

My story illustration of Anansi and the Yam Hills. created at my Howard University class for a children's book illustration assignment.

My Anansesem comic strip panel telling the story of Asantehene, Osei Tutu, and the Golden Stool of Asanti, and how he came to power in the 17th Century in Ghana. Here at a gathering, Anokye, the priest, brought down a golden stool in a clod of white dust. The stool, cementing his power, gently landed on Osei Tutu’s knees, anointing him as the Aantehene or ruler of the Asanti Empire.

My Anansi rag doll, books, and comic strip panels.

The Yoruba gods series in Jamaica 

There are many people of both Yoruba and Ibo descent in the island. Some have retained many aspects of their Nigerian culture.

Olokun, Yoruba God of the Sea. with mudfish for his legs, next to my photo in a Howard University faculty exhibition. An ode to the Caribbean Sea.-Welded steel.

   

My Obatala, the Yoruba's Father God wall sculpture -- Welded and woven metal, etched and painted Plexiglass

(Top): Wall sculpture of  Ogun the Yoruba God of Metallurgy & War; (Middle) Enlargement of his sword with his icon, a dog; (Bottom) His head and a cast bronze bumblebee cap. -- Welded bicycle rims, ans cast bronze.