The Importance of Acknowledging Our History: NARA’s Facilities in the Atlanta Area

This is another installment of our ongoing blog series that acknowledges the ancestral lands on which the National Archives’ buildings are situated. This series of acknowledgements is a simple way to offer recognition and respect to the people who once lived on these lands. 

The Jimmy Carter Presidential Library and Museum is located in Atlanta, Georgia,  along with two other facilities run by the National Archives: the National Archives at Atlanta, in Morrow, and the Atlanta Federal Records Center, which is located in Ellenwood.

The National Archives at Atlanta
The National Archives at Atlanta
The Jimmy Carter Presidential Library
The Jimmy Carter Presidential Library
The Atlanta Federal Records Center
The Atlanta Federal Records Center

All of these National Archives facilities are situated on the ancestral lands of the Muscogee Nation, also known as the Muscogee Creek Nation, a part of the Creek Confederacy. 

Map showing the Muskogee Nation.
Source: Native Land
Map showing the Muskogee Nation.
Source: Native Land

“The Muscogee (Creek) people are descendants of a remarkable culture that, before 1500 AD, spanned the entire region known today as the Southeastern United States. Early ancestors of the Muscogee constructed magnificent earthen pyramids along the rivers of this region as part of their elaborate ceremonial complexes. The historic Muscogee, known as Mound builders, later built expansive towns within these same broad river valleys in the present states of Alabama, Georgia, Florida and South Carolina.”

From: MuscogeeNation.com

My thanks to Gwen E. Granados, Director of the National Archives at Riverside, and Christopher Geissler, Deputy Director of the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library and Museum, who researched the information for this land acknowledgement. 

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