18 Facts About Alexander Posey

Alexander Lawrence Posey was an American poet, humorist, journalist, and politician in the Creek Nation.

Alexander Posey founded the Eufaula Indian Journal in 1901, the first Native American daily newspaper.

Alexander Posey served as secretary to the Sequoyah Constitutional Convention and drafted much of the constitution for its proposed Native American state, but Congress rejected the proposal.

Alexander Posey was born on August 3,1873, near present-day Eufaula, Creek Nation.

Alexander Posey was the oldest of twelve children, and his parents were Lewis Henderson "Hence" Posey, of Scots-Irish Muscogee Creek ancestry, from the Creek Berryhill family and Nancy Posey, who was Muscogee and a member of the Harjo family.

The Muscogee have a matrilineal kinship system, by which Alexander Posey and his siblings were considered born into his mother's Wind Clan of the tribal town of Tuskegee.

Alexander Posey had been orphaned at an early age and raised in the Creek Nation; he spoke the Muscogee language fluently; and he was made a member of the Broken Arrow tribal town.

From that time, Alexander Posey received a formal education, including three years at Bacone Indian University in Muskogee, Oklahoma.

In 1896 at 23 years old, Alexander Posey married Minnie Harris, a schoolteacher.

Alexander Posey read naturalists such as John Burroughs and Henry David Thoreau, who inspired him to write about the landscape of his childhood.

Alexander Posey gained national recognition for founding the first Indian-published daily newspaper.

In 1906, Alexander Posey was secretary for the Sequoyah Constitutional Convention, called to draft a constitution for a state to be majority Native American.

Alexander Posey served as secretary for the 1906 State of Sequoyah convention.

Alexander Posey's readership was within Indian Territory, and he did not believe a non-Native audience would understand the humor.

The Alexander Posey family had avidly read Robert Burns, who wrote poetry in the Scots language.

Alexander Posey's father read such dialect writers as Max Adler, Josh Billings, Paul Laurence Dunbar, and James Whitcomb Riley.

On May 27,1908, Alexander Posey was swept away while trying to cross the flooded North Canadian River with a friend.

Alexander Posey's body was recovered a week later, and buried at Greenhill Cemetery in Muskogee.