The Ramapough Lenape Nation is a

state-recognized tribe State-recognized tribes in the United States are organizations that identify as Native American tribes or heritage groups that do not meet the criteria for federally recognized Indian tribes but have been recognized by a process established unde ...

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

. They were previously named the Ramapough Mountain Indians (also spelled Ramapo), also known as the Ramapough Lenape Nation or Ramapough Lunaape Munsee Delaware Nation. They have approximately 5,000 members who primarily live around the

Ramapo Mountains The Ramapo Mountains are a forested chain of the Appalachian Mountains in northeastern New Jersey and southeastern New York, in the United States. They range in height from in New Jersey, and in New York. Several parks and forest preserves en ...

Bergen Bergen (), historically Bjørgvin, is a city and municipality in Vestland county on the west coast of Norway. , its population is roughly 285,900. Bergen is the second-largest city in Norway. The municipality covers and is on the peninsula o ...

and

Passaic Passaic ( or ) is a city in Passaic County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the city had a total population of 70,537, ranking as the 16th largest municipality in New Jersey and an increase of 656 from the 69,7 ...

counties in northern

and

Rockland County Rockland County is the southernmost county on the west side of the Hudson River in the U.S. state of New York. It is part of the New York metropolitan area. It is about from the Bronx at their closest points. The county's population, as of t ...

in southern New York, about 25 miles (40 km) from

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

. They are not a

federally recognized This is a list of federally recognized tribes in the contiguous United States of America. There are also federally recognized Alaska Native tribes. , 574 Indian tribes were legally recognized by the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) of the United ...

Native American tribe, but they are state-recognized by New Jersey. Their tribal office is located on Stag Hill Road on Houvenkopf Mountain in

Mahwah, New Jersey Mahwah is the northernmost and largest municipality by geographic area () in Bergen County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the population of the township was 25,487, a decline of 403 from the 25,890 counted in the ...

. Since January 2007, the chief of the Ramapough Lenape Nation is Dwaine Perry. The Ramapough Lenape Indian Nation claims descent from the Lenape, or Delaware people, although the Bureau of Indian Affairs did not find evidence of Lenape ancestry. A decision subsequently upheld upon appeal.

Petition for federal recognition

The Ramapough Mountain Indians (RMI) filed a letter of intent to petition for the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) for

federal recognition This is a list of federally recognized tribes in the contiguous United States of America. There are also federally recognized Alaska Native tribes. , 574 Indian tribes were legally recognized by the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) of the United ...

as a Native American tribe in 1979. Approved on January 16, 1996, the BIA shared its final determination federal acknowledgment of the Ramapough Mountain Indians. The proposed final determination stated that Criterion 83.7(b) required:

Evidence that a substantial portion of the petitioning group inhabits a specific area or lives in a community viewed as American Indian and distinct from other populations in the area and that its members are descendants of an Indian tribe which historically inhabited a specific area (43 F.R. 172, 39363).Ada E. Deer
"Summer Under the Criteria..."
p. 21.

The Proposed Finding concluded that the RMI did not meet this criterion at any point in time, for although there was substantial evidence that a distinct community had existed for a portion of the petitioner's history, from approximately 1870 until approximately 1950, this community had neither been "viewed as American Indian" nor were its members "descendants of an Indian tribe which historically inhabited a specific area."

The proposed finding went on to say:

Historians, anthropologists, and journalists have mentioned many tribes as possible precursors of the RMI: Munsee, Minisink, Tuscarora, Creek, Lenape (generally), Hackensack, and Delaware. However, none of the documentation submitted by the petitioner or any other documents reviewed for the proposed finding connected the earliest documented RMI ancestors with any of the tribes that once resided in New York or New Jersey.

After the RMI appealed the proposed finding, the BIA issued a reconsidered final determination that took effect January 7, 1998: "Assistant Secretary–Indian Affairs

Ada E. Deer Ada Deer (born 1935) is a member of the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin and a Native Americans in the United States, Native American advocate, scholar and civil servant. As an activist she opposed the federal termination of tribes from the 19 ...

signed a reconsidered final determination which affirms the decision of January 16, 1996, to decline to acknowledge that the Ramapough Mountain Indians, Inc. (RMI)."

State-recognition

The State of New Jersey recognizes the Ramapough Lenape Nation. The State of New York does not recognize the Ramapough Lenape Nation. The Ramapough and two other tribes were recognized as Indian tribes in 1980 by the state of

by Resolution 3031. The New Jersey citation read:

Be it resolved by the General Assembly of the State of New Jersey (the Senate concurring): 1. That the Ramapough Mountain People of the Ramapough Mountains of Bergen and Passaic counties, descendants of the Iroquois and Algonquin nations, are hereby designated by the State of New Jersey as the Ramapough Indians.

The tribe approached its New Jersey Assembly member,

W. Cary Edwards William Cary Edwards (July 20, 1944 – October 20, 2010) was a New Jersey politician who served as the Attorney General of New Jersey from 1986 to 1989. Early life He was born on July 20, 1944, in Paterson, New Jersey or Ridgewood, New Jer ...

, to seek state recognition. After several months of research, Edwards and Assemblyman Kern introduced Assembly Concurrent Resolution No. 3031 (ACR3031) on May 21, 1979. It passed the Assembly and was passed by the Senate on January 7, 1980. Edwards later said that debate in the assembly related to the Cohen book (see below); he noted that he and other supporters of recognition had to demonstrate the historical basis of the Ramapough. At the time, the state had not developed its own criteria or regulations related to tribal recognition. The state resolution also called for Federal recognition of the Ramapough, but is non-binding in that regard.Ramapough Mountain Indian Final Determination, CD-2, file 2_4_Part01.pdf pp.138-141 AR005026 through AR005029 (available from the BIA under the Freedom of Information Act) The state of New Jersey has also recognized the Nanticoke Lenni-Lenape and the Powhatan Renape, descended from the Algonquian-speaking Lenape and Powhatan, respectively. Because of increased issues related to Native Americans, the State of New Jersey created the Commission on Native American Affairs by P.L.1134, c. 295, and it was signed into law on December 22, 1995, by Governor Christine Todd Whitman.

Nonprofit organization

In 1980, the group incorporated as a 501(c)(3)

nonprofit organization A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...

. Currently, its name is Ramapough Lunaape Nation, Inc. Its principal officer is Duane Perry, whose name is more commonly spelled "Dwaine." Based in Mahwah, New Jersey, its focus is "Ethnic/Immigrant Services (P84)."

Name

The Ramapough Lenape Nation, also Ramapough Lunaape Nation, Inc., was previously called the Ramapough Mountain Indians, also spelled Ramapo. They have also used the name Ramapough Lunaape Munsee Delaware Nation. Until the 1970s, the group was frequently referred to as the Jackson Whites, a derogatory term, which, according to legend, was either from the name of the Jackson White heirloom potato or shorthand for "Jacks and Whites", reflecting their multiracial ancestry."Ramapough Mountain People drawn into their own", ''St. Petersburg Times'', March 18, 1976, p. 50. In part because of the people's claimed multiracial ancestry, the outside community assumed they were descendants of runaway and freed slaves ("Jacks" in

slang Slang is vocabulary (words, phrases, and linguistic usages) of an informal register, common in spoken conversation but avoided in formal writing. It also sometimes refers to the language generally exclusive to the members of particular in-g ...

) and whites. Over time, the latter were believed to have included

Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...

settlers (reflected in surnames common among the people) and later, Hessian soldiers, German mercenaries who had fought for the

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

during the

American Revolution The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revoluti ...

; that is, people who were considered suspect by the dominant British Americans. The people supposedly fled to frontier areas of the mountains after the end of the Revolutionary War. Thousands of escaped slaves had gone to British-occupied New York City on the promise of freedom. Some left the city for more isolated areas to escape capture after the war. There is no documentation of slaves, freed or runaway, nor of Hessian soldiers' marrying into the tribe. The group rejects "Jacks" and "Jackson Whites" and their associated legends as pejorative labels.Bischoff, Henry & Kahn, Mitchell (1979), ''From Pioneer Settlement to Suburb, a History of Mahwah, New Jersey 1700-1976'', A. S. Barnes & Co., p. 210 On July 30, 1880, ''The Bergen Democrat'' was the first newspaper to print the term Jackson Whites. A 1911 article noted it was used as a title of contempt. Instead, they called themselves "The Mountain People." The New Jersey historian David S. Cohen, argued in his doctoral dissertation at Princeton that the old stories were legends, not history. He wrote that the legend was "the continuing vehicle for the erroneous and derogatory stereotype of the Mountain People."Cohen, David Steven (1974), ''The Ramapo Mountain People'', New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, pp. 74, 197, He claims that some of the group's ancestors were multiracial, free Afro-Dutch who had migrated from lower Manhattan to the frontier and become landowners in the Tappan Patent in the seventeenth century.

History

A number of local historians, genealogists, and archeologists have written about the Ramapough people. Accounts have evolved as archeological, historical, linguistic, and other research has advanced. As with other multiracial peoples seeking recognition as Native American tribes, the Ramapough Mountain Indians have encountered differences of opinion over the significance of ethnic ancestry in contrast to cultural and community identity in being recognized as a distinct culture. The historian David Cohen found that early settlers in the Hackensack Valley included "free black landowners in

and mulattoes with some Dutch ancestry who were among the first pioneers to settle in the

Hackensack River The Hackensack River is a river, approximately 45 miles (72 km) long, in the U.S. states of New York (state), New York and New Jersey, emptying into Newark Bay, a back chamber of New York Harbor. The drainage basin, watershed of the ri ...

Valley of New Jersey." Among these were Augustine Van Donck, who bought land in the Tappan Patent in 1687. As the border between New York and New Jersey split the area of the patent in 1798, Cohen theorized that some of these early free people of color moved west into the mountains. (The surname Van Dunk is common among the Ramapough, as are DeGroat, DeFreese, and Mann.) Cohen thought that, while some free blacks may have married Lenape remnant peoples in the area, the residents of the mountains developed not primarily of Indian culture but as multiracial people of European-American culture, with rural traditions. The origin of these surnames could also be from earlier contact times with the Colonials. In the late 19th century, such Indians were said to use the names given by the Colonials instead of their real names because of superstition. Edward J. Lenik, a self-taught private archaeologist, and author of 11 historical books on Eastern Woodlands Native American History, disagrees with Cohen's findings about African-European ancestry; he says,

While the Ramapough's origins are controversial, most historians and anthropologists agree that they (Ramapough) are the descendants from local Munsee-speaking Lenape (Delaware) Indians who fled to the mountains in the late seventeenth century to escape Dutch and English settlers. It is a well known fact that displacement of Indian tribes followed European Incursions in the region which resulted in the forced movement and resettlement of Indian peoples.

Controversy over origins

The multiracial ancestry of the people in the mountains was noted by their European American neighbors. Myths, as noted in the section on their name, were derived in part from theories of origins, as well as prejudice related to unions with African descendants because slavery had developed in the colonies as a racial caste. By the mid-nineteenth century, these multi-racial mountain people were concentrated in the settlements of Mahwah and

Ringwood, New Jersey Ringwood is a borough in Passaic County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, the borough's population was 11,735, a decline of 493 (−4.0%) from the 2010 census count of 12,228,Hillburn, New York. Local histories documented traditions of mixed-race descendants from intermarriages with the Lenape in the mountains. In the 20th century, some anthropologists classified such isolated mixed-race groups, who tended to be historically

endogamous Endogamy is the practice of marrying within a specific social group, religious denomination, caste, or ethnic group, rejecting those from others as unsuitable for marriage or other close personal relationships. Endogamy is common in many cultu ...

, as tri-racial isolates or simply as mixed bloods. In 1915, Alanson Skinner of the American Museum of Natural History noted the multiracial character of the people in the Ramapo Mountains. He said that Indian descendants had mixed with Africans and Caucasians. Cohen noted in 1974 that, as the federal censuses of 1790-1830 were missing for this area, it prevented "establishing positively the exact relationship between many of these colored families in the mountains, and the earlier colored families of the Hackensack River Valley." He noted the "tradition of Indian ancestry among the Ramapo Mountain People as early as the eighteenth century." Cohen also said, "Some Indian mixture is possible; however, Indian and colored interracial matings probably were not recorded in the Dutch Reformed Churches." Before 1870, the State of New Jersey Census had only three racial or ethnic categories for residents: White, Black (free), and Black (slave), the same categories as were used in the slave states. Census enumerators tended to use black as the category for any people of color, including Indians. In 1870, New Jersey began recording Indians (Native Americans) as a separate category in its census; 16 were identified by census enumerators that year. A less common theory of ancestry was that the Ramapough were Indian people who had been held as slaves by colonists. Henry H. Goddard, ''The

Vineland Training School The Vineland Training School is a non-profit organization in Vineland, New Jersey with the mission of educating people with developmental disabilities so they can live independently. It has been a leader in research and testing. The Training Sch ...

Study'', 1911. Ramapough Mountain Indian Final Determination, CD-5, file 6_4_2_Part01.pdf page AR023346 (available from the BIA under the

Freedom of Information Act Freedom of Information Act may refer to the following legislations in different jurisdictions which mandate the national government to disclose certain data to the general public upon request: * Freedom of Information Act 1982, the Australian act * ...

) "But how oaccount for the Indian Blood that shows itself so conspicuously among this race today? Undoubtedly a large part of it comes from Indians who were formerly held as slaves." With increasing interest and research in Native American history, a 1984 symposium was held on the Lenape. James Revey (Lone Bear), then chairman of the New Jersey Indian Office, said that "Mountain Indians" were descendants of Lenape who had retreated into the mountains of western and northeastern New Jersey and southwestern New York during the colonial era. Other scholars, such as Herbert C. Kraft, have documented that some

Munsee The Munsee (or Minsi or Muncee) or mə́n'si·w ( del, Monsiyok)Online Lenape Talking Dictionary, "Munsee Indians"Link/ref> are a subtribe of the Lenape, originally constituting one of the three great divisions of that nation and dwelling along ...

-speaking Lenape moved into the Ramapo Mountains to escape colonial encroachment. Kraft, Herbert C. (1986), ''The Lenape: Archaeology, History, and Ethnography'', New Jersey Historical Society, Newark, NJ. p. 241, Kraft noted, as did Cohen (see below), that there was a gap in "the genealogical record between about 1790-1830 that prevented his assembling with exactitude individual relationships between most of the Hackensack Valley settlers and those of the Ramapo Mountains." In his own work, Kraft has not attempted to establish genealogical links between the present-day Ramapough and colonial-era Indian tribes. According to Catalano and Planche, consultants for the tribe in its recognition process, Cohen's work has been criticized by the genealogists Alcon Pierce and Roger Joslyn. Catalano said that Cohen had no professional credentials in genealogy and that the BIA found much of his genealogical work lacking. Edward J. Lenik, an archeologist and author of a 1999 book about the Ramapo Indians, writes:

The archaeological record indicates a strong, continuous and persistent presence of Indian bands in the northern Highlands Physiographic Providence-Ramapos well into the 18th century. Other data, such as historical accounts, record the presence of Indians in the Highlands during the 19th and 20th centuries. Oral traditions, and settlement and subsistence activities are examined as well. Native American people were a significant element among the primary progenitors of the Ramapo Mountain People ...

Historian Evan T. Pritchard, wrote

The Ramapough, or "mountaineer Munsee", on the other hand, never disappeared. Their people still occupy the southwest portion of the point of Rockland County, on all sides of Ramapo Mountain. ... Whites have always tried, and continue to try to portray the Ramapough as foreigners: Dutch, blacks,
Tuscarora Tuscarora may refer to the following: First nations and Native American people and culture * Tuscarora people **''Federal Power Commission v. Tuscarora Indian Nation'' (1960) * Tuscarora language, an Iroquoian language of the Tuscarora people * ...
,
Gypsies The Romani (also spelled Romany or Rromani , ), colloquially known as the Roma, are an Indo-Aryan ethnic group, traditionally nomadic itinerants. They live in Europe and Anatolia, and have diaspora populations located worldwide, with sign ...
, or Hessians. However, they are the only actual non-foreigners to be found still living in community in and around New York's metropolitan region. ... The main Ramapough Lenape villages in New York were Hillburn, Johnsontown, Furmanville, Sherwoodville, Bulsontown, Willowgrove, Sandyfields, and Ladentown. Better known, however, as Native American strongholds, are the towns just south of the border, namely Stagg Hill ahwahand Ringwood.

The archeologist C.A. Weslager (1906–1994) wrote Lenape were joined some migrating

Tuscarora Tuscarora may refer to the following: First nations and Native American people and culture * Tuscarora people **''Federal Power Commission v. Tuscarora Indian Nation'' (1960) * Tuscarora language, an Iroquoian language of the Tuscarora people * ...

families fleeing South Carolina. They never continued to Iroquois country in New York, where most of the Tuscarora settled alongside the Oneida.

Governance

The Ramapough Mountain Indians have had a chief and council form of government. In 1978 they organized a nonprofit organization. That year they filed a petition with the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs of intent to gain federal recognition as a tribe. They further organized into clans for self-government: the Wolf, the Turtle and the Deer, related to their three main settlements of Mahwah and

Ringwood, New Jersey Ringwood is a borough in Passaic County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, the borough's population was 11,735, a decline of 493 (−4.0%) from the 2010 census count of 12,228,Hillburn, New York. The Ramapough Nation is a member of the National Congress of American Indians(NCAI), and are recognized as indigenous by them.

Recent events

In 1995, New Jersey established a Commission on American Indian Affairs (then called the Commission on Native American Affairs) with two seats each for the recognized tribes of the Ramapough Mountain Indians, the Nanticoke Lenni-Lenape, and the Powhatan Renape (the latter two groups are located in southern New Jersey.) In addition, two seats were reserved for Inter-Tribal Members, persons who belonged to other tribes but lived in New Jersey. The Commission has been placed in the Department of State. In the spring of 2006, Emil Mann, a Ramapough Lenape man, was killed by gunshots from a New Jersey State Parks Police ranger in a confrontation with people on ATVs in Ringwood State Park. His family filed a civil suit against the state. Governor

Jon Corzine Jon Stevens Corzine ( ; born January 1, 1947) is an American financial executive and retired politician who served as a United States Senator from New Jersey from 2001 to 2006 and the 54th governor of New Jersey from 2006 to 2010. Corzine ran fo ...

's staff met with the Ramapough Lenape and other Native Americans in the state to identify problem areas and improve relations. The state undertook an investigation into the shooting, and a grand jury indicted one of the rangers. In August 2006, Governor

formed the New Jersey Committee on Native American Community Affairs to investigate issues of civil rights, education, employment, fair housing, environmental protection, health care, infrastructure and equal opportunity confronting members of New Jersey's three indigenous Native American tribes and other New Jersey residents of Native American descent. The Committee's report was delivered on December 17, 2007 and cited "lingering discrimination, ignorance of state history and culture, and cynicism in the treatment of Indian people". State and federal officials have worked with the tribes on other issues related to their people. For instance, in preparation for the 2010 census, state and federal officials consulted with the recognized tribes on means to get accurate counts of their people. The

Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau (USCB), officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal Statistical System of the United States, U.S. Federal Statistical System, responsible for producing data about the Americans, Ame ...

has created local partnerships. It recognizes State Designated Tribal Statistical Areas (SDTSA), which are established by state consultation with local tribes to identify significant areas of American Indian populations outside reservations (these had been overlooked in the twentieth century). In New Jersey, these are identified as

and Bergen counties for the Ramapough Mountain Tribe, and

Cumberland County Cumberland County may refer to: Australia * Cumberland County, New South Wales * the former name of Cumberland Land District, Tasmania, Australia Canada *Cumberland County, Nova Scotia United Kingdom * Cumberland, historic county *Cumberla ...

for the Nanticoke Lenni-Lenape. The Rankokus Indian Reservation no longer qualifies, as the state has taken back much of the land it had earlier leased to the Powhatan Renape.

Tribal enrollment

The tribe requires members to have at least one Ramapough parent.

Environmental concerns

The tribe has experienced environmental controversies in relation to corporate efforts on or near their land:

Ford Motor Company paint contamination controversy

Members of the community have participated in litigation (''Mann v. Ford'') against the

Ford Motor Company Ford Motor Company (commonly known as Ford) is an American multinational automobile manufacturer headquartered in Dearborn, Michigan, United States. It was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. The company sells automobi ...

regarding poisoning from a former

toxic waste Toxic waste is any unwanted material in all forms that can cause harm (e.g. by being inhaled, swallowed, or absorbed through the skin). Mostly generated by industry, consumer products like televisions, computers, and phones contain toxic chemi ...

landfill, the Ringwood Mines landfill site. Portions of this site were used in the 1970s as sites for affordable housing for the Ramapough people. In the 1980s, the Environmental Protection Agency designated the Ringwood Mines landfill site as a Superfund site for cleanup. Ford had operated an auto assembly plant in Mahwah and its contractors dumped industrial paints and other hazardous wastes in a landfill owned by the company in an area where many Ramapough Mountain Indians live. The EPA identified further remediation three more times as additional sludge sites were found. Following further investigation, The EPA returned the community to the Superfund list, the only site to be so treated. In late winter 2006, some 600 Ramapough Lenape Indians, led by Wayne Mann and with the aid of

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Robert Francis Kennedy Jr. (born January 17, 1954) is an American environmental lawyer and author known for promoting anti-vaccine propaganda and conspiracy theories. Kennedy is a son of U.S. senator Robert F. Kennedy and a nephew of President ...

, filed a mass tort suit (''Mann v. Ford'') against the "Ford Motor Company and its contractors, as well as the borough of Ringwood, for the dumping of toxic waste." They were represented by Vicki Gilliam of The Cochran Group. The suit was filed about the time of publication of ''Toxic Legacy'', a five-part investigative series by '' The Record'', which had found lead and antimony levels in excess of 100 times the safety limit near some Ramapough residences. The paint sludge has been linked to contamination of food and water sources with lead and benzene. The contamination has been linked to nosebleeds, leukemia, and other ailments among the community. The HBO documentary ''Mann v. Ford'' (2011) follows the pursuit of the lawsuit. During the 2008–2010 automotive industry crisis, at a time when it appeared that Ford might be in danger of going bankrupt, the Ramapough feared that the company might be gone and Ford acted on those fears, and in September 2009 the tribe accepted a settlement of $11 million from Ford and its contractors, plus $1.5 million from the town of Ringwood, for an average payout of $8,000 per Ramapough resident after attorney fees. The EPA has directed the removal of an additional 47,000 tons of sludge and soil up to 2011, with cleanup continuing.

The Pilgrim Pipeline and Split Rock Sweetwater Prayer Camp

As of 2017, the tribe is fighting against the

Pilgrim Pipeline The Pilgrim Pipeline was a planned 178-mile pipeline that would deliver up to 200,000 barrels of crude oil and other fuel products per day from Albany, New York to coastal Linden, New Jersey on the Arthur Kill. By 2021, the Pilgrim Pipelines Hold ...

. Pilgrim Pipelines Holdings, LLC plans to run a dual pipeline through the tribe's land which would carry refined products like gasoline, diesel, kerosene, aviation fuel and home heating oil north and Bakken formation crude oil south between

Albany, New York Albany ( ) is the capital of the U.S. state of New York, also the seat and largest city of Albany County. Albany is on the west bank of the Hudson River, about south of its confluence with the Mohawk River, and about north of New York C ...

and the Bayway Refinery on the Chemical Coast in Linden, New Jersey. The line would also pass through the Ramapo Mountains and Ramapo Pass. In solidarity with

Standing Rock The Standing Rock Reservation ( lkt, Íŋyaŋ Woslál Háŋ) lies across the border between North Dakota, North and South Dakota in the United States, and is inhabited by ethnic "Hunkpapa Lakota, Hunkpapa and Sihasapa bands of Lakota Oyate a ...

, tribal members founded the Split Rock Sweetwater protest encampment in

in 2016 near the New York border to protest the Pilgrim Pipeline.

Representation in art, entertainment, and media

Film

*''Mann v. Ford'' (2011) is a documentary about the lawsuit filed by the Ramapough Lenape Indian Nation against Ford. It is regularly shown on HBO. Directed by Maro Chermayeff and Mica Fink, it features Paul Mann of the Ramapough and Vicki Gilliam of The Cochran Firm, which represented the tribe. It follows the five years of the Ramapough pursuing the suit and how they reached settlement with the company. *''American Native'' (2013) is a documentary that details the Ramapough Lenape Nation's efforts to gain federal recognition as a Native American nation and the difficulties it has encountered due to loss of lands, racism, and loss of records. *The film ''

Out of the Furnace ''Out of the Furnace'' is a 2013 American crime drama film directed by Scott Cooper, from a screenplay written by Cooper and Brad Ingelsby. Produced by Ridley Scott and Leonardo DiCaprio, the film stars Christian Bale, Casey Affleck, Woody ...

'' (2013) is a fictional drama dealing with communities living in the Ramapough Mountains, starring

Christian Bale Christian Charles Philip Bale (born 30 January 1974) is an English actor. Known for his versatility and physical transformations for his roles, he has been a leading man in films of several genres. He has received various accolades, including ...

and Zoe Saldana. Tribal leaders and town officials from Mahwah urged a boycott of the film due to negative depictions of the Ramapough Lenape Nation, which Dwaine Perry called a hate crime.

Relativity Media Relativity Media is an American media company founded in 2004 by Lynwood Spinks and Ryan Kavanaugh. The company brokered film finance deals and later branched into film production and other entertainment ventures. The company was commerciall ...

responded that the film "is not based on any one person or group" and is "entirely fictional". Nine members of the group, eight of whom have the surname DeGroat, which is given to the film's antagonist, filed suit against the makers and other involved parties. They claimed that ''Out of the Furnace'' portrays a gang of criminals living in the Ramapo Mountains who are "lawless, drug-addicted, impoverished and violent". On May 16, 2014, U.S. District Court Judge William Walls, sitting in

Newark, New Jersey Newark ( , ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey and the seat of Essex County and the second largest city within the New York metropolitan area.Brooklyn Demme.

Television

* ''

The Red Road The red road is a modern English-language concept of the right path of life, as inspired by some of the beliefs found in a variety of Native American spiritual teachings. The term is used primarily in the Pan-Indian and New Age communities,McGaa ...

'' (2014), is a six-part HBO/

SundanceTV Sundance TV (formerly known as Sundance Channel) is an American pay television channel owned by AMC Networks that launched on February 1, 1996. The channel is named after Robert Redford's character in ''Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid'' and, w ...

made for television miniseries.

Sources

* Penford, Saxby Voulaer., "Romantic Suffern: The History of Suffern, New York, from the Earliest Times to the Incorporation of the Village in 1896", Tallman, NY, 1955, Chapter 6 Ramapo Mountain Folk

References

External links

Ramapough Lenape Nation
official website *Ed Lenik, ''Indians in the Ramapos, Survival, Persistence & Presence''], North Jersey Highlands Historical Association, 1999
Strangers On The Mountain
''The New Yorker'' Ben McGrath. 1 March 2010.

North Jersey Highlands Historical Association, 2011

HBO documentary about 2006 Ramapough lawsuit against Ford Motor Company * Office of Federal Acknowledgement, Asst. Sec. Indian Affs., U.S. Dep't of the Interior
Petitioner #058: Ramapough Mountain Indians, Inc., NJ
(procedural and adjudicative history).
American Native The MovieThe Upper Ringwood Collection: Featuring the Ramapough Mountain Indians
a project of the Ringwood Public Library {{authority control Ramapough Mountain Indians, Algonquian ethnonyms Bergen County, New Jersey Native American tribes in New Jersey Passaic County, New Jersey Rockland County, New York State-recognized tribes in the United States