Pleasant Porter
| Pleasant Porter | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
September 26, 1840 Indian Territory (now Wagoner County, Oklahoma) |
| Died | September 3, 1907 (aged 66) Vinita, Indian Territory (now Vinita, Oklahoma) |
| Other names | Talof Harjo ("Crazy Bear") |
| Occupation | Businessman, statesman |
| Known for | Principal chief of Creek Nation, President of Sequoyah Constitutional Convention |
Pleasant Porter (September 26, 1840 – September 3, 1907), was a respected American Indian statesman and the Principal Chief of the Creek Nation from 1899 until his death. He served with the Confederacy in the 1st Creek Mounted Volunteers, as Superintendent of Schools in the Creek Nation (1870), as commander of the Creek Light Horsemen (1883), and was many times the Creek delegate to the United States Congress. He was also President of the Sequoyah Constitutional Convention in 1905 during the attempt by Native American tribes to acquire statehood for the Indian Territory. Instead, their territory was made part of the state of Oklahoma.
Pleasant Porter was the son of Benjamin Edward Porter and Phoebe Perryman, daughter of Lydia Perryman, a mixed-blood Creek daughter of Chief Perryman), and Tah-lo-pee Tust-a-nuk-kee, a town chief. He was a mix-blood Creek born into his mother's Bird Clan. The Creek had a matrilineal kinship system, in which children took status in their mother's clan.
He was born September 26, 1840 in what is now Wagoner County, Oklahoma. His Creek name was Talof Harjo, which means "Crazy Bear" in English.
The family ranch was begun by his grandfather, John Snodgrass Porter, who had fought with Andrew Jackson against the Creek in Georgia after the massacre at Fort Mims. To minimize further bloodshed, Captain Porter volunteered to mediate between the Creek leaders and white army. Grateful for his efforts, the Creek adopted him into the tribe. First, he settled on Creek land in Russell County, Alabama. When the Indian Removal program began, he moved with the first group of Lower Creek who went to Indian Territory in the 1820s. There, he settled on the north bank of the Arkansas River and developed a plantation based on the labor of enslaved African Americans.
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