Wigwam Festival

From Wigwam Festival Website:

2020 Mohegan Wigwam Festival
Saturday, August 15 & Sunday, August 16, 2020
10:00am to 7:00pm
Everyone is welcome!

The Wigwam Festival is a modern version of the ancient Mohegan Thanksgiving for the Com Harvest, or Green Corn Festival. Before the arrival of the Europeans, Mohegans held many Thanksgivings throughout the year in gratitude to the Creator for the earth's many gifts. Most significant was this Wigwam Festival or "Corn Thanksgiving," at which tribes people annually reconnected with Mundu, the Creator and Great Mystery. Com was celebrated because it is the sustainer of life and spirit. Gladys Tantaquidgeon tells us that "In very early times, there was a fair tree near where Mohegan Church now stands, and the Green Com Festival was held there."

At the time of the breakup of the Mohegan reservation in the mid-nineteenth century, Medicine Woman Emma Baker revitalized the Com Festival, which then became known as the "Wigwam." Emma incorporated the Wigwam's restoration into the goals of the Mohegan Church Ladies' Sewing Society in 1860. By physically linking this festival to Mohegan Church in the year before the Mohegan Reservation began to break up, Emma focused tribal solidarity around the only post-reservation tribally owned land parcels.