Bradley Indian Mission to Host Centennial Celebration
BRADLEY, MICHIGAN – The Bradley Indian Mission will host a centennial celebration of the Church building this coming weekend on Saturday, May 17 and Sunday, May 18.
May 14 is the 100-year birthday of the current Church building at the Bradley Indian Mission. The Mission dates back to the 1830s.
The Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians, commonly referred to as the Gun Lake Tribe, has a well-documented history with the Bradley Indian Mission that dates back to the early 1800s. The Bradley Indian Mission is the historic residential and cultural center point of the Gun Lake tribal community. The Mission has had housing, a church, and a cemetery, and at times a thriving American Indian pastorate.
Throughout the long history of the Bradley Indian Mission, the church bell was a means of communication; when it was rung area residents would follow trails to the Mission to learn of news.
The Tribe’s relationship with the Bradley Indian Mission played a critical role in its ability to gain federal recognition by the United States in 1999.
On Saturday, May 17, from 2 – 4 p.m. the Church will have an open house to showcase historic artifacts and pictures, and renovations that are currently underway. From 4 – 6 p.m. the Church will offer a dinner. At 6 p.m. there will be a special service to commemorate past ministers.
Sunday, May 18, will feature a breakfast followed by regularly scheduled church service at 10 a.m.
The Bradley Indian Mission is located at: 695 128th Ave Shelbyville, Michigan 49344.
The general public is welcome to attend these historic events.
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About The Author
Editor
Levi Rickert, a tribal citizen of the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation, is the publisher and editor of Native News Online. Previously, he served as editor of the Native News Network. He is a resident of Grand Rapids, Michigan.
So interesting about the church bell at the Bradley Indian Mission. The bell in the steeple of our little summer chapel on an island in the Adirondacks dates from 1880. And it too was used to communicate. We had no telephone or electricity there until the 1960s.
Then after my dad (the minister) died in 1995, my brother was filming a video of the church and rang the bell. Immediately, folks on a nearby island telephoned to see what the emergency was!