A Trust Betrayed?

"It's not about the money," says Moses' granddaughter Ruby Withrow, a nurse who administers a diabetes program for the Absentee Shawnee tribe. "I want some justice for a man who trusted the United States and was betrayed." The BIA has looked into the family's claims and says that while the records for Moses Bruno's account may not be complete, "no instance of malfeasance was found in the records that we examined." In a fax to TIME, the agency stated that "understandably, the family did not review these files with a historian's commitment to objectivity."

Still, the search for what happened to Moses Bruno's land has produced a new sense of equanimity for his family. There have been several meetings to bring all the descendants — some 200 plus — up to date on the stories the documents tell. Leon Bruno has started a nonprofit corporation, funded by garage sales, raffles and donations from family and friends, that he hopes will eventually allow the family to pay for an organized study of its Potawatomi culture and language. He and his wife Veta attend the annual gatherings of the nine Potawatomi bands, now scattered over several states. Leon has gone through the training and fasting that are required of those chosen as the tribe's honored fire keepers. And he has built a roundhouse on his property in Tecumseh, Okla., where family members gather four times a year to light a sacred fire and pray for the memory of their ancestor Moses Bruno.