86 For the past six years, Haggard has worked withthetribetotracetheirhistoryandgather themountainofevidencethattheBureauof IndianAffairsrequires.Hehascrisscrossed Mississippitointerviewmorethan70tribal members.Hehasscouredlandrecords, courtdocuments,schoolrecords,newspaper clippings,censusreports,andcolonial documentsfromtheSpanish,British,and French—justaboutanythingandeverything hecouldgethishandsonthatmentionsthe tribe—toprovethetribe’shistoricalexistence andrighttorecognition.Hiscolleague,Dr. JohnCrowley,anassociateprofessorof historyatVSUwhospecializesingenealogy, hashelpedtoverifythetribe’slineage. Most of Haggard’s research is in writing now, almost 200 pages, single-spaced. He is not taking any chances, he said, and is making sure every detail is included. Sometimes citations for one note take up a whole page. “There are lots of groups that want to claim to be Indian that are not, so they had to be legitimate,” he said, referencing his decision to work with the tribe. “And they are. Their heritage holds up.” Haggard, 55, is not part of the Pascagoula River Tribe. He is not even Native American. But his passion for Native American culture and history started when he was just a boy in the second grade searching the library shelves, looking for his next adventure. “There was a small shelf of Indian books in my school library, but it was outside the easy section so I wasn’t allowed to check any of them out,” he said. “We had a 15-minute break in the mornings, so I would just go and read as many pages as I could in the 15 minutes and then put it back on the shelf and come back the next day. That’s the beginning of me being interested in Indian history. “I liked reading about them because they were different from everybody else. There was a book on the Cherokees, the Sioux, and they’re all so unique. That’s probably something that makes me different from most people. I recognized that they weren’t all the same.” Haggard studied history in college, and while pursuing a master’s degree, he decided to write his thesis on the military history of the Cherokee War, the conflict that unfolded from 1759 to 1761 during the French and Indian War. It was between British forces in North America and the Cherokees, two parties that had previously been allies. His research allowed him to explain why the British, including a few American colonies, did what they did in the war, but one large question remained: Why did the Cherokees get into a war with their allies and do something that doesn’t make any sense at all from an economic, military, or political perspective? This may end up being my life’s work. — DR. DIXIE HAGGARD “ “ 86