Samson Occom - Legacy

Legacy

Samson Occom oversaw the establishment of Native townships and New Stockbridge and Brotherton (originally nearby Waterville, NY) during a period after several tribes agreed with New York lawmakers to reserve land for European settlement. Occom is responsible not only for the civil charter of these villages in 1787 but also for the April 12, 1792 eviction of white settlers from the village of Brotherton. This has helped set the legal precedent for the Red man's dual citizenship to both the United States, and for the nation of tribal heritage.

In the first half of the 1800s many Brothertown Indians people moved to what is now known as the Town of Brothertown in Calumet County, Wisconsin. The Brothertown Indians are currently petitioning the federal government for recognition as a tribe. to be federally recognized - in effect, re-recognized. Federal recognition was initially stripped from the Brothertown people when they accepted United States citizenship in an effort to avoid being displaced yet again. Since then, United States policy has changed and Native American people are, quite obviously, both American citizens - as well as citizens of their respective Nations. However the policy as implemented among the Brothertown Indians, the first Native Americans granted US citizenship, at the time stripped them of what today is called tribal sovereignty.

In World War II, the United States liberty ship SS Samson Occom was named in his honor.

Several locations around Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, are named after him. Occom Pond and Occom Ridge are located on the northern edge of the college campus. Bruce Duthu is the Samson Occom Professor and Chair of Native American Studies Program. The Occom Commons community space is part of Goldstein Hall, in the recently opened McLaughlin Residential Cluster. Elsewhere, an upperclassmen residence hall named after Occom is located on the campus of Eastern Connecticut State University in Willimantic, Connecticut.