Seek's Village: The Miami Reservation That Was Taken
Near Fort Wayne, Indiana
You are standing within the boundaries of what was once Seek's Village, a Miami Indian reservation in northeastern Indiana. The Miami Nation had lived in this region of the Great Lakes and upper Wabash River valley for centuries before American expansion pushed them into a series of treaties that reduced their lands to small reserved tracts. Seek's Village was one of those remnants.
In eighteen forty-six, the United States government carried out the removal of most Miami to a reservation in Kansas, and the residents of this village were swept up in that removal, joining the forced displacement of dozens of other Miami communities across Indiana. The removal of the Miami from Indiana was a quieter chapter than the more publicized Trail of Tears, but it followed the same logic and caused the same devastation. The Miami retained a small Indiana presence, and today both the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma and the Miami Nation of Indians of Indiana maintain their heritage, though only the Oklahoma tribe holds federal recognition.
