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Hello, and welcome to Wild and Wonderful West Virginia! West Virginia is the home of thousands of Native American descendants and is rich in Native American history. Despite the fact that our state is not the home of a federally recognized reservation, we take pride in that rich history and our Native American heritage.

The Adena and Hopewell peoples are the first recorded tribes known to have built their homes and burial mounds in West Virginia. Evidence of their presence can be found every time a farmer plows his fields. Small mounds still dot the landscape of our community. One such mound is located at Camden Park in Huntington. But, if you are looking for an experience, you can visit the Grave Creek Mound in Moundsville, WV. It is the largest Adena Burial Mound in the United States and was built around 250 BC.

In the 1600 and 1700's other recorded tribes in West Virginia and the Ohio River Valley were the Shawnee,Cherokee, Mohawk, Oneida, Ononodaga, Cayuga, Seneca, Lenape, Monacan and Tuscaroras. West Virginia's mountains and caves provided a perfect hiding place for our ancestors during the sad years of the great Indian removal, now known as the Trail of Tears. Because some chose to hide, they did not get counted on the reservation rolls. The Cherokee in this area were once referred to as the "people of the caves." To this day, many of our ancestors still keep the secret of their heritage.

The Native American Indian Federation, Inc. is located in Huntington, WV and at one time, our valley was within the northern boundry of the Cherokee Nation and the southern boundry of the Shawnee.