Don Wildman

During this time, of course, this begins with the Spanish conquistadors coming up from the south.

That's the early 1500s.

It's later on that the French come along, and that will evolve, of course, into the Louisiana Purchase later on and the Americans arriving.

I'm just trying to get a handle on how, over this period of time, how the Choctaw understood the coming of the white man and how generally they were going to deal with that.

The rug has to be, I mean, it's pulled out from under you because of the Louisiana Purchase eventually, right?

Because it becomes a complete shift of mission, really.

The French are concerned with primarily the Caribbean and all of that.

And suddenly the Americans are coming because this is their land as they now see it.

Little do they know.

How did the Choctaw deal with the Americans after the Louisiana Purchase on into the War of 1812 and so forth?

Yeah.

It's such an important factor.

These nations have been in these lands.

How sophisticated they were, how strong they were, having recovered from a lot of what you're talking about, the disease and so forth, they were reorganized and retrenched.

And suddenly comes a new kind of threat.

And that's what we'll be talking about.

We're back discussing the Trail of Tears with Ryan Spring of the Choctaw Nation.

Ryan, we've talked about the ancestral lands and the origin stories of this nation, and then the Europeans arriving, the Spanish, the French, the English even.

I want to now turn to the United States, which has become such a player now in terms of the Louisiana Purchase and all that's going on.

How are these treaties brokered together?