Abstract
Abstract In Pre-Colombian times the Alabama-Coushatta migrated throughout the southern part of North America. De Soto recorded their presence in Alabama and Mississippi in 1541 and between 1700 and 1763 they were under the political control of the benevolent French. After 1763 the American colonists pushed westward, forcing the Indians to retreat beyond the Mississippi where East Texas' “Big Thicket” became their adopted home. In 1854 the State of Texas gave the Alabama Tribe a reservation tract in the Big Thicket which restricted their usual economy of sedentary farming, hunting, gathering, and fishing into an environment much too small to sustain the tribe. In the last hundred years the tribe has tried farm labor, logging, and migrating to the white man's cities as paths to an improved life. Since 1964 they have operated a tourism enterprise on the reservation and it appears that for the first time in their history a satisfactory solution for their poverty has been found.
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