Historic house cradles a homecoming for the Lenape indigenous people

TUCKAHOE, New York -- Back in 1700, Edward Ward acquired the entirety of Eastchester from the Lenape in exchange for a modest assortment of guns, coats, kettles, cider, axes and woodworking tools.

Generations later, community leaders are acknowledging mistakes and taking steps to preserve the area's remaining indigenous people and their culture.

Former Tuckahoe Mayor Omayra Andino took action after learning how the Lenape lost their land. "One of the first things I did as mayor was to develop, or at least establish historic preservation," she says.

The Ward House, named after the family who made the land deal with the Lenape, has been the site of foundational moments in American history. The building has served as a dwelling, post office, tavern, community center and college dorm over its 250-plus years. Its most recent developer had hit a wall and Andino saw an opportunity to try to help right a longstanding wrong.

The former mayor says she "reached out to the county executive to see if he would consider purchasing this property."

Westchester County Executive Ken Jenkins and the Board of Legislatures were all in. "With all of our folks working together, we were able to put this in front of the board of legislatures, acquire this property and add it to the facilities that we have," says Jenkins, referring to Westchester's Parks Department, which now manages and maintains the property.

The plan is to make much needed repairs before the Lenape Center, a nonprofit preserving native arts and culture, relocates to the property and transforms it into a community space.

Hadrien Coumans, the center's co-founder and deputy director, describes its mission as "continuing Lenapehoking." Lenapehoking is the name the Lenape gave their homeland, a stretch along the eastern seaboard that spans from Connecticut to Delaware.

Practically, the mission is aimed at "returning a presence that had been almost extinguished through the centuries of colonization and forced removal," according to Coumans.

He says the center is planning to make the space "a nucleus of Lenape culture, history, expression and community," by turning it into "permanent exhibition space, temporary exhibition space meeting space; a place for education, for installations for presentations - all of the activities that have been really part of our Lenape Center ecosystem."