When I was a child, I remember my grandfather telling me the story of Sarah Greene.  She was a young girl who lived on the outskirts of town on the wrong side of the tracks.  “Man we had trouble with her.” Grandfather would say.  She grew up on the wrong side of the tracks and there was rumor that she had Native blood in her.  As far as I know it was just that.  A rumor, and not even a good one.  As if Native Americans were anymore or less “savage” than white people.  Grandpa used to say, “People are people and part of people being people is people making up rumors about people to make it easier for people to treat people like they aren’t just people who are people.”  Hence, the scurrilous rumor of her “savage blood.”  Grandpa had the good sense to be chagrined of how ignorant people can be, but to his credit, he didn’t try to make history sound more enlightened by hiding that fact.
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