First, the war chant.

‘Ohhhhhh – oh – ohhhh – ohhh.’

Then a person dressed as Chief Osceola appears on the football field. He’s astride on an Appaloosa horse, flaming spear and all.

Finally, the Florida State Seminoles take the football field.

For Syracuse assistant professor Scott Lyons, it’s all too much to bear. And not because he’s an SU fan; because he’s American Indian.

‘No more Indian mascots,’ said Lyons, an Ojibwe from Leech Lake Reservation in Minnesota. ‘They mock us as people and ridicule our cultures.’

But Florida State isn’t the only culprit in Lyons’ mind – any team with an Indian nickname or mascot is at fault.

Twenty-five years ago and Lyons probably would have also had a problem with the team lining up against No. 6 FSU this Saturday at 3:30 p.m. at Doak Campbell Stadium.

In other words – his current school – Syracuse.

That’s because Syracuse’s old mascot was the Saltine Warrior, an Indian figure named Big Chief Bill Orange.

Anybody that needs a reminder can get one on the way to the next home football game. Big Chief Bill Orange is the bronze statue outside the Carrier Dome – muscular and fierce, bow pointed to the sky. It’s that very depiction that make American Indian mascots so offensive, Lyons said.

‘By definition, (mascots) are cartoonish and unreal, playing in stereotypes and exaggeration,’ Lyons said. ‘For example, the fierce tiger, the powerful bison, the wily wildcat and so on. They’re supposed to be fun and give rise to enthusiastic expression at sporting events, like face painting and cheers.

‘There’s nothing wrong with any of that – that is, until real, living people are placed in the mascot’s role: the noble Indian, the savage warrior, etc.’

Lyons said when that happens, real human beings are reduced to the exaggerated stereotype and fans are encouraged to have fun at American Indians’ expense, from mocking ceremonial dances to disrespecting religious symbols.

According to a statement from the Onondaga Nation Council of Chiefs, that’s exactly what occurred at SU.

The Saltine Warrior all started as a hoax. The Syracuse Orange Peel published a story in 1931 saying the remains of a 16th-century Onondagan chief were found in the excavations for the new women’s gymnasium.

So the statue was sculpted in 1951 and the mascot came about in the mid-1950s.

The father of a Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity brother made a Saltine Warrior costume for his son to wear at SU football games. Soon after, the costume became SU’s mascot.

In 1978, Onondaga Nation and the American Indian student organization on campus had enough.

‘The depiction of an Indian running around in leather and a Sioux war bonnet was not only incorrect, but offensive,’ reads a statement from the Onondaga Nation Council of Chiefs. ‘(There) is no dignity within the native community when the Saltine Warrior meets and jousts with wildcats, hogs, bulldogs in front of thousands of people.’

After negotiations, the Saltine Warrior was removed.

For SU senior and Onondaga Nation member Sarah Moses, it made a big difference.

‘I wouldn’t have gone to Syracuse if we were still the Saltine Warriors,’ Moses said.

Moses rejuvenated the Native American Students at Syracuse group three years ago when she came to campus. Its goal is to make the campus more aware that American Indians aren’t just people in the past, but in the present.

‘At SU, no one goes off the Hill,’ Moses said. ‘They don’t understand that if they go 10 minutes down the road, they’re right in Onondaga Nation country.’

For Moses, that was the biggest problem with the Saltine Warrior mascot. SU had no relationship with Onondaga Nation and still doesn’t.

‘I’ve had people come up to me on this campus and say, ‘You’re the first Indian I’ve ever met,” Moses said. ‘And I don’t know what to say. So a lot of people don’t know any Native Americans, so when they see the mascot, they don’t see people.’

That’s an issue Florida State says it doesn’t have. The media relations department said the FSU administration has a constant open dialogue with the Seminole tribe and do everything with its blessing.

Lyons, who’s also a columnist for Indian Country Today, said that doesn’t matter.

‘Tribally specific mascots like the Seminoles or Fighting Sioux are no different from any other Indian mascot,’ Lyons said. ‘It’s still an Indian mascot. This idea of universities securing ‘permission’ from a local tribe government for its mascot is no less absurd than the thought of a white blackface performer securing permission from an African-American.’

Lyons said if Florida State really wanted to honor its relationship with the Seminoles, they would rename the university ‘Florida Seminole University’ and give the tribe power on the Board of Trustees.

It’s all a fight Lyons has fought before.

As a master’s student at the University of North Dakota (Fighting Sioux) and while getting his doctorate at Miami University (then the Redskins), he campaigned for the schools to change their mascots. Lyons succeeded at Miami, now known as the RedHawks.

When the NCAA banned schools with American Indian mascots from postseason play earlier this year, Lyons thought it was finally a step in the right direction – until the NCAA backpedaled.

FSU and Utah were two of the schools cleared of the ban.

‘When they issued the initial policy in early August, the NCAA proved that they had ears, heart and brain,’ Lyons said. ‘That is, they showed they could listen, feel and think. More recently, however, with all these backroom deals, they’ve had some difficulty exhibiting a backbone.’

For Moses, it’s discouraging that only American Indians have to deal with this problem.

‘I know the argument of tradition,’ Moses said, ‘and I feel for that. Tradition is everything in Native American culture. But this country has a tradition of racism, and that tradition needs to be broken also.’

Published on September 28, 2005 at 12:00 pm