Strength and Courage: Native American Cancer Survivor Stories

In 2006, the Lance Armstrong Foundation provided funding to the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation (MPTN) cancer research team to establish the first Native American cancer survivor archive.  In 2007 the New England Division of the American Cancer Society provided additional funding to expand this effort.  The purpose of the archive is to document Native American experiences of cancer in order to provide educational information to current and future generations. Native American cancer survivors and their caregivers are invited to share their story.  The transcripts of taped interviews are available for the general public, researchers, and others interested in the cancer experience among Native Americans. Mementos that cancer survivors wish to donate are also being collected.  Cancer stories from men and women of all ages are being collected; the archive is an active work-in-progress with stories continually being added. The long-term goal of the archive is to collect donations from Native American cancer survivors throughout the Northeast.  

Native Americans in Popular Culture
Archives & Special Collections actively collects an extensive range of materials that document how Native Americans are portrayed in popular culture. The collection includes many forms of advertising; souvenirs; tourism ephemera; posters; labels; poster stamps; movie posters and lobby cards; toys; sheet music; paper money; and a wide variety of other printed materials; as well as 3-dimensional artifacts. American Indian hobbyists (non-Natives who sought to imitate Native American culture) are depicted through photographs as well as through the literature, manuscripts, brochures, and ephemera that hobbyists created. The bulk of the collection dates from the mid-18th to the early 20th centuries and contains materials in many formats.

Manuscripts
The manuscript collection focuses primarily on New England tribes. It includes ledgers, some kept by government appointed overseers; minutes of tribal meetings; letters; petitions; deeds, surveys and other documentation for land transactions; court records and legal proceedings; and descriptions of language.

Printed Materials, including Broadsides
Printed materials that were created by or for Native Americans include boarding school publications, miscellaneous newspapers and newsletters, pamphlets, brochures, broadsides, and sermons. Other printed materials include newspaper clippings; pamphlets; congressional publications; rare books, some by Native authors; broadsides; and ephemera.

Maps and Atlases
Maps in the collection document Native American territories, trade routes, and exploration. Elaborate cartouches and other decorative details that portray Native peoples and indigenous flora and fauna decorate some maps. Maps in the collection date from the mid-sixteenth to the late twentieth centuries.

Visual Resources
Engravings, photographs, videos, broadsides, labels, and signage are some of the Visual Resources in the Special Collections. Early images of Native Americans and their villages are rendered in engravings that date from the late 16th century. Many of these engravings are in rare books in the collections. The Popular Culture Collection also contains hundreds of images. Many items that fall in the category of Visual Resources have been digitally imaged and may be viewed on-site in a digital format.