HOME IS SHELTER What does home mean to you It likely means many things It’s the place you share with your family It’s where you eat meals and sleep It’s the place you celebrate special occasions It’s where you find shelter in bad weather and comfort after a bad day Home was all these things to Native Americans as well But not all Native American homes looked alike Different groups of Native Americans built different kinds of homes depending partly on the natural resources around them 4 MESA VERDE NATIONAL PARK IN COLORADO
Swiss artist Karl Bodmer traveled through the American West in the 1830s creating pictures of the land and Native Americans This print copies a picture Bodmer made of the inside of a Mandan Indian home 5
HIDES EARTH SNOW AND MORE Native Americans used many kinds of natural resources to make their homes Some groups used bison or buffalo hides Some used trees branches bark and grass Others used earth and mud Still others used adobe blocks and stone And in the cold Arctic areas of the North some used snow and ice A group’s way of life also shaped Native American homes Some groups lived in settled villages while others were nomadic and needed homes they could carry with them 6
The picture on the left shows the homes and crops in a settled Native American village in the East The picture here shows the home used by nomadic Plains Indians which was easy to set up take down and carry with them when they moved DID YOU KNOW Weather was an important consideration too It gets up to 100 F 38 C in the Arizona desert and down to 50 F 46 C in Arctic areas 7
