BRADLEY, MI (WHTC-AM/FM) – It has been two decades of growth for the Gun Lake Tribe.
On Friday, it will be 20 years since the Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians achieved formal federal re-affirmation. Although its members have been in the Kalamazoo River Valley since the early 19th century, it took the intervention of the Church to establish a mission near the site of the current Gun Lake Casino in Bradley to prevent the Tribe from being forced to move west when they signed away a reservation in what is now downtown Kalamazoo in 1827.
“As a people, we’ve always been here,” said Tribal Council Secretary Jeff Martin during a Thursday interview on “WHTC Morning News,” “but through this recognition, that has given us the opportunity to succeed in asserting our sovereignty, our economic development, and (establishing a) favorable way of life in this civilization so that we can have a strong voice, we can succeed, and we’ll always be here.”
The re-affirmation was a key factor in the eventual development of the gaming house off of 129th Avenue and US-131, along with a convenience store and a sprawling tribal government complex.
