If you have ever been out to the Ottawa Indian Mission Cemetery, you may have noticed a plain tombstone, right beside a barbed wire fence, that has one word etched into it. NOTINO. Who is Notino? He is a man identified as a Principal Chief and Medicine Man among the Ottawa Indians. In his journals, Ottawa Indian Mission Founder, Rev. Jotham Meeker, mentions Notino more than 100 times. Notino and Meeker were frequently at Council meetings and prayer meetings together, worked their farms together and often traveled together. Meeker even baptized Notino into the Christian faith April 3rd, 1842. Notino’s son, David Green, was the first Ottawa tribe member Meeker converted to Christianity. Notino’s other son, Shawponda, also known as Chief James Wind, served as an Ottawa University Trustee and was one of the Ottawa leaders who rebelled against the Ottawa Town Company to protect the rights of the Ottawa Tribe.
Notino died October 30th, 1846. He is buried at the Ottawa Indian Cemetery, his name etched for eternity, in a plain gravestone.
If you haven’t been to the Ottawa Indian Cemetery, make a point to visit.
That’s your KOFO History Lesson for the day.
