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David Nelson is route planner for the 28th annual Trail of Tears Commemorative Motorcycle Ride, which is only two weeks away.
For 27 years, thousands of motorcyclists join a multi-state parade for the Commemorative Motorcycle Ride for the Trail of Tears. The public is welcome to meet and greet the riders when they roll through Murphy about 11:15 a.m. Friday, Sept. 17, at the BP on U.S. 64 West, where riders will refuel and snack up.
Every third Saturday in September, cyclists line up in Cherokee to begin the five-day event. The route roughly follows the same path Native Americans were tragically forced to travel under the 1830 Indian Removal Act, which relocated Native Americans from their ancestral lands.
Originally, the government relied on barges on the Tennessee River to carry thousands of tribal members out of the Appalachians into the expansive West. The barges successfully removed more than 5,000 Native Americans to Oklahoma.
However, by June 1838, the United States experienced an unprecedented drought, causing the water levels to drop too low to use as transport. The government remained determined to complete the removal, and as a result made the decision to force the migration overland. This overland path became known as the “Trail of Tears,” and is the route used for the commemorative motorcycle ride.
Because of the length and distance, many cyclists join for only portions of the ride, with the ranks swelling up to 10,000 riders during The Big Ride from Bridgeport to Waterloo, Ala. The ride finishes in Oklahoma, where a signed flag is presented to tribal leaders in acknowledgement of all that was lost to them on the Trail of Tears.
Oklahoma is home to five reservations, which the riders rotate through each year. This year, the Choctaw Reservation in Broken Bow will host the flag ceremony.