Dear Ms. McDonald,
As a lifelong Vermonter, I’m disappointed that you didn’t do your homework before this interview. At 10:59 your comment “Why is that the business of people in Canada… why are they worried about what we’re doing here in Vermont if we’re OK with it?” reveals a lack of basic understanding of the entire issue. I hope to see members of the Abenaki Nation on your show soon so that you, and your audience, have a full understanding of why Mr. Steven’s’ claims are verifiably false. Please don’t be mislead by his appeals to emotion.

Please don’t support frauds. Native Identity fraud, the colonization of Native identity is genocide. Thank you.

The FACTS are out there.How can Odanak First Nation be perpetuating “Lateral Violence” when these Vermont groups of “Abenaki” have only existed post-1975, post-1992, post-2004 and post-2006 (?) are not related to Odanak First Nation whatsoever? Oh sure they have a few Odanak familial descendants now in their groups by their own contemporary choice, but that does not make these groups historically Abenakis whatsover. … Odanak First Nation doesn’t recognize these people. Nulhegan-Coosuk group came out of the Clan of the Hawk in 2004. Right there documented in the Newport, VT Newspaper! They are NOT related to Odanak, and certainly the Phillips family are not related to anyone in Odanak First Nation. Neither are the Bruchac’s. Louis (1844-1918) the father of Jesse Bowman, was a full blooded illegitimate 100% Frenchman from VAUDRY and SENECAL. Seriously, Vermonter’s THINK ABOUT WHEN these groups came into being, as in incorporated UNDER VT or NH State laws.

https://youtu.be/Yym0T_ML4QY THESE GROUPS are not “sovereign” and they are not Nations, though Don “Juan” Stevens Jr. implies. WATCH this video: https://youtu.be/wr8YgKTbOcA (This is Don’’s cousin). https://youtu.be/tRJTgse8lnU. Don Stevens merely has a French-Huron/Algonquin ancestress, Marie Sylvestre Prevost/Provost in the 1600s and his Phillips derives from the PHELPS lineage, i.e., Peter Phelps (Colored) who died in late 1865 in St. Albans. The Y-DNA of this Phillips ancestry (meaning paternal) is B-M181 … and for those who don’t know what that means, it means that the Y-DNA Haplogroup is from AFRICA, to the West Indies, up to Connecticut, and into Sheldon (formerly Hungerford Twp.) in Franklin County, Vermont, because Peter Phelps came up with other Black persons/families with Elnathan Keyes and the Sheldon Family.

Clearly, studying the Phelps and Phillips Families in northwest Vermont, etc, Peter Phelps (Colored), Antoine Phillips (Colored) Peter Phillips Sr. (Mulatto), [This same Peter Phillips No. #1 and his brother Michael Phillips No. #1 were identified as Colored Frenchmen in 1859 and Peter was identified as Mulatto in the 1859 Windsor State Prison Intake record], Peter Phillips No. #2 “a very large Negro” in Dec. 1913; and Peter Phillips NO. #3 self identifying in Aug. 1938. All of this per the Vermont newspapers. Vital Records sometimes identified this family as Black, Colored, Darky, etc in the VT-NH-ME-NY Records as well. The genetic Y-DNA Haplogroup of the paternal Phillips family members afore mentioned, are B-M181 … from Africa. So the TRUTH is this Don Stevens Jr. is LYING about his Phillips ancestry and his “becoming Abenaki” post-1975. The family was PASSING as “Gypsies” then apparently “Mohawk” and then post-1975 “As Abenakis”. Understand? They nor Don Stevens Jr. of this Nulhegan group that was merely created in the summer of 2004 as an Corporated Posing as an Indigenous Nation (CPAIN) have been actually historical whatsoever. MANY of them are not descended from anyone Native since the 1600s.

Please spare us all the DRAMA of the narrative from the fraudulently recognized “Abenakis”. Anyone can easily do a google search and begin to put the pieces together of these “Abenakis” fraud, lies, insinuations. As for the Vermont Eugenics, no one in that material was ever identified as being Abenaki, from the Abenakis etc. Hmm interesting. The material is PUBLIC RECORDS. The reasons the Phillips family as documented therein, is again, researched easily simply by studying the Vermont newspapers! My own Woodward ancestors lateral descendants were documented in the VT-NH Eugenics Survey, and some even were documented as being sterilized by Vermont and New Hampshire institutions.

The Vermont Eugenics SURVEY was not sterilizing anyone! It was a SURVEY. Most certainly not any Abenakis were sterilized as can be discerned thus far. Scholar Richard Witting has deeply studied this. The two author Nancy Gallagher and that of Mercedes De Guadiola (spelling) were clearly biased in their research, respectively. Same with Havilland, Calloway, and many other academics in the Northeast about Vermont’s “Abenakis”.

The VT NH Eugenicists were documenting the incarcerated, the institutionalized, and the inmates of Poor Farms, Prisons, and Mental Facilities and also documenting those persons considered the impoverished ’n’er-do-wells’ from the likes of the published Burlington Free Press newspaper, etc. and talking to these families they were documenting, including communicating with numerous Town Clerks and Overseer of the Poor agents in Vermont Towns and other agencies in neighboring states, i.e., the Children’s Aide Societies and Orphanages, and Prisons. THINK about what Don Stevens is saying, versus what is DOCUMENTED objectively, about the Eugenics and about the actual Abenakis, then and today.

Eugenicist Charles B. Davenport, wrote about transients and the poor, and the gypsies in the midwest etc., and Vermont Professor Henry Farnham Perkins of Burlington, VT through his employee Harriet E. Abbott had studied the Phillips “gypsy” family branches in 1925-1936. She also worked for the Children’s Aide Society!

“Basket makers” does not an Abenaki make. Africans, Irish, Russian, and other ethnic groups made and make baskets too, then and nowadays. Claiming subjectively to being “Indians” (either “Mohawk”, “Kickapoo” in the V.E.S.; or today as “Abenaki”) does not objectively substantiated any descent from any Abenaki historical community ancestrally whatsoever. Understand?

Listen to Odanak First Nation! Please, Don Stevens nor any of his ancestors are connected to any historical Abenaki communities. Neither are MANY of these “Abenakis” in Vermont and or New Hampshire. Or even Massachusetts, Connecticut, or Rhode Island for that matter. So WHO ARE THEY REALLY?! Do the necessary objective research! I have done so for years!

Their applications (obviously compiled and or constructed by JSC Professor Wiseman) for fraudulent state recognition were fraught with inaccuracies, untruths, and with simple objective research, the legislature (anyone!) would have been discerned (if the State Legislature had a unbiased and trained in depth genealogist) these distortions and put the brakes on this recognition processes. The VCNAA was staked in favors these “Abenaki” groups with biased scholars with documented work histories retrospectives with one or more of these “Abenaki” groups! It’s all documented objectively.

The 4 Alburgh Indians were Mohawks (unnamed) from the NY Akwesasne Mohawk Community, in the Civil War!

The tin-type of Antoine Phillips was not of Sr. but of Antoine Phillips Jr.

The Wabanacus RPPC was of Odanak First Nation’s Chief Nicolas Panadis who periodically came with his relatives to Highgate, Franklin County, Vermont, selling baskets etc. NOT of any Chief of Vermont “Abenakis”.

I could go on, but I will not bore folks any further. These groups hid-their-genealogies while claiming that they were “Abenakis” by descent, yet refused then and now to prove it. They claim that Odanak is their relatives yet refer to Odanak First Nation as “ex-patriots” and “a foreign nation” etc.

How can any of this be ‘lateral violence’ by Odanak First Nation, if these people such as Don Stevens Jr. in the video, are not relatives of Odanak First Nations Abenakis? The Vermont “Abenakis” post-1975 began their campaign of appropriation and cultural and linguistic extraction as Abenaki Culture Vultures.

It’s become profitable to “become Abenaki” post-1975.

Any decent researcher can discern these dynamics today, with a simple Google Search, keen to discerning the TRUTH, and REALITY of what has been happening throughout the Northeast.

These groups have infringed on Federal Recognized Tribal Sovereignty. Don Stevens Jr. has hijacked the 1796 Land Deed of Chief Philipp and Louie Métallic, neither of whom were The Last of their Tribe here in Northern New Hampshire or Northeast Vermont whatsoever! (hint for any of you researchers out there). Antoine Phillips Sr. was not connected in any way shape or form to those Maliseets or those “Eastern” Abenakis of the late 1700s.

My apologies for being long winded herein, but suffice to say that Vermont’s have for far too long been hoodwinked by fake “Abenakis” within Vermont and throughout the Northeast, because most White People KNOW ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about Abenaki People, nor about Abenaki history, let alone about Don Stevens Jr.‘s genealogical ancestry. If they studied these members genealogies, as I have, Vermonter’s would be aghast at the FRAUD going on.

Ms McDonald, Please invite our Abenaki Nation to respond to the “speculations” made by Mr. Stevens he was allowed to claim against the Abenaki Nation of Odanak in this interview. That would fair and impartial journalism. Point – Counterpoint.
Denise L. Watso, Abenaki Nation citizen, WATSO (WAJO=MOUNTAIN) An ABENAKI FAMILY NAME LIVING IN OUR TERRITORY SINCE TIME IMMEMORIAL.
Wli Wni (thank you)