Hi Louis,
The FN list covered this BAUM topic just recently due to Barbara Johnson (who lives in Aberdeen and is working on the OZ festival)--it turned into a big mess and she was removed from the list. Jordan put up a page for emailing the City of Aberdeen regarding Baum. Barbara was trying to convince Indian peoples here that *they* wanted to set up a booth and have Indian speakers to tell *their* side of the story and how they felt about Baum--can you imagine having a long time festival for Baum to honor him and at the same time a token booth and speaker to speak against the man. WE called for an end to the Festival as it stands now and to refocus on the truth about this man and how his articles played a huge part regarding Wounded Knee. His articles indeed kept the local white folks stirred up to the point of sheer fear and those people demanded that the government DO something to prevent the Indians from harming the population.
I posted some information in the IHF list and John stated that Baum was not racist but just passing on information as to how the People there felt. I read the articles that Baum wrote and this is NOT the feeling I got. I felt that he was just as racist as anyone else living there and printed what he and others felt.
Aberdeen is now working on the Festival for next year and we are Boycotting it Big Time.
Thanks for posting this,
Karen
Louis Proyect (http://www.panix.com/~lnp3/marxism.html)