Why I call them the Cleveland ball club

I don’t call the ball club from Cleveland by their name. Seeing close-ups of their players makes me cringe. It’s not superstition or anxiety about the game. Every time I hear their team name and see their cartoon mascot I think of the Sand Creek Massacre.

I visited the site of the November 29, 1864, Sand Creek Massacre this summer when I was in Colorado. I took an interstate to a highway to a narrow road to a dirt road to get to this sacred site that is a long way from everywhere. I couldn’t even see the Rocky Mountains from this sun-baked patch of southeastern Colorado. I squinted even though I was wearing sunglasses. Sagebrush and cottonwood trees marked the landscape. The Sand Creek riverbed was dry. The rangers warned of rattle snakes.

John Evans, a Methodist who was among the founders of Northwestern University, was the Colorado Territory Governor in 1864. He exploited the growing tensions between white settlers and Native Americans for his own political and business gains. His speeches added to the fear-filled air, even issuing a proclamation in August 1864 for citizens to “kill and destroy … hostile Indians.”