Tunica-Biloxi Indian Reservation

The Tunica-Biloxi Tribe of Louisiana kept its land by staying put. After the Louisiana Purchase, settlers registered Tunica ground as unoccupied, yet the village on the Avoyelles Prairie held on and escaped the removals of the 1830s and 1840s. The tribe lost a land claim in the Louisiana Supreme Court in the 1890s, and a 1920 state ruling found no recognition setting the Tunicas apart. Since 1911 the Marksville village has elected its chief and recorded the results at the courthouse. Federal recognition came in 1981 under Chairman Earl J. Barbry Sr.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Tunica-Biloxi Museum — steps away
  The Tunica-Biloxi Tribe of Louisiana's own museum at Marksville, built around the Tunica Treasure that the tribe won back in court.
• Avoyelles Parish Courthouse: Solomon Northup Marker — 1.2 mi
  The Marksville courthouse where Solomon Northup was freed in January 1853, with a marker and a 2026 bronze that shows him rising from the mud.
• Epps House: Solomon Northup's Gateway to Freedom — 21 mi
  The Creole cottage Solomon Northup helped build for the man who enslaved him, moved twice and now a small museum on the LSU Alexandria campus.
• Arna Bontemps African American Museum — 26 mi
  The restored Alexandria house where the Harlem Renaissance writer Arna Bontemps was born in 1902, on the Louisiana African American Heritage Trail.

More markers nearby

• The Marksville Site — 0.3 mi
• Presentation Academy — 0.3 mi
• Holy Ghost Catholic Church — 0.9 mi
• Holy Ghost Catholic School — 1.0 mi