Indigenous Peoples Day

Indigenous people marked Monday with celebrations of their heritage, education campaigns and a push for the Biden administration to make good on its word.

A federal grant will help expand and improve a Vermont center that celebrates the culture of the area’s original inhabitants and provides educational opportunities about Native American heritage. “I can’t wait to bring our grandchildren,” said Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, the chairman of the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee. Leahy delivered $250,000 in funding for the Vermont Indigenous Heritage Center,...

More work is being done to honor the original inhabitants of Vermont on Indigenous People’s Day.

Monday’s federal holiday dedicated to Christopher Columbus is highlighting the ongoing divide between those who view the explorer as a representative of Italian Americans’ history and those horrified by an annual tribute that ignores the native people whose lives and culture were forever changed by colonialism.

Organizers of Saturday’s event say they want Gov. Charlie Baker to make Indigenous People’s Day a statewide holiday.

Native American groups are rallying on Boston Common to observe Indigenous Peoples Day and to call on state leaders to do more to support their communities. Organizers of Saturday’s event say they want Gov. Charlie Baker to make Indigenous People’s Day a statewide holiday. They also want Christopher Columbus Park in Boston renamed. Mahtowin Munro, co-leader of United American...

President Joe Biden has issued the first-ever presidential proclamation of Indigenous Peoples’ Day

The second Monday in October, celebrated for years as Columbus Day, will be recognized as Indigenous Peoples Day in Boston starting this year, Mayor Kim Janey has announced. It’s an effort to recognize and celebrate the Massachusett Tribe, who lived where Boston now stands before colonizers arrived, as well as the neighboring Wampanoag and Nipmuc tribes. “Observing Indigenous Peoples...

If the Boston Athletic Association wants the Boston Marathon to run though Brookline this year, it’ll need to do more to recognize native groups. Some members of the Brookline Select Board are threatening to stop the annual event from coming through town if the BAA doesn’t do more, according to the Boston Globe. This year’s race is scheduled on...

Native Americans in Massachusetts are calling on the organizers of the Boston Marathon to move the already rescheduled date for the storied race because it now conflicts with a day meant to commemorate the contributions of Indigenous people. The Boston Athletic Association announced in January that the 125th edition of the marathon would be pushed back from its traditional April…

Four centuries after white Europeans stepped off the Mayflower and onto America’s shores, some descendants of the colonists are wrestling with the complicated legacy of their ancestors amid a global racial reckoning. There is immense pride among those who can trace their families back to the passengers who boarded the ship in Plymouth, England, in 1620 to flee religious persecution…

As the mythology around Christopher Columbus has been corrected, many are pushing to replace Columbus Day with a celebration of Indigenous Peoples’ Day. A cultural strategist and diversity expert, Lauren Wesley Wilson, joined LX News to discuss the importance of recognizing the oppressed rather than celebrating their oppressors.

Maine is observing a new holiday. Monday marked the first Indigenous People’s Day in the state after Maine lawmakers replaced Columbus Day in the spring.

A statue of Christopher Columbus was found vandalized in Rhode Island Monday, the day many observe the holiday named for him. The statue in Elmwood was found with the word “genocide” painted on its base and a sign saying “Stop Celebrating Genocide” chained around it, WJAR reports. Photographs of the scene show bright, red paint splattered on the statue.

“Columbus enslaved, colonized, mutilated, and massacred thousands of Indigenous People in the Americas,” Council Member David Grosso said in a statement.

The mayor of Waterville said his city would observe Columbus Day in defiance of Maine law.

A conservative mayor in Maine says he plans to declare Oct. 14 to be Columbus Day, in defiance of state law. The Kennebec Journal reports Waterville Mayor Nick Isgro’s proclamation would defy a state law passed in April that renamed the holiday Indigenous People’s Day.

Vermont has joined a handful of states in renaming Columbus Day to honor Native Americans. Republican Gov. Phil Scott signed a bill into law on Friday recognizing the second Monday in October as Indigenous Peoples’ Day.

Vermont is close to becoming one of the first states to legally rename Columbus Day. Republican Gov. Phil Scott says he is likely to sign a bill into law that would recognize the second Monday in October as Indigenous Peoples’ Day.