Learn the History of the El Camino Real with Chief Rufus Davis

ChiefDavis

Join us at the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame and Northwest Louisiana History Museum Saturday, May 6 at 2 pm as Chief Rufus Davis of the Adai Caddo Nation presents a history of one of the most ancient roads in American history. This program is free and open to the public.

The El Camino Real was created over a thousand years ago by wild bison migrating south from the Great Plains. The Indians of the Adai Indian Nation used the El Camino Real to establish a trade network from Texas to Louisiana. Indian trade routes going from Village to Village existed long before the Spaniards named the El Camino Real Trail as they visited the Indian Villages to set up Catholic Indian Mission Churches in the Tejas Country. Spanish and French explorers used this same road to open trade relations between the French and Spanish frontiers from Natchitoches to Mexico during the 17th and 18th centuries.

Chief Davis has been Chief of The Adai Caddo Nation since 1989. His passion to move the nation to federal recognition stirred his journey to uncover the rich history of the Adai Caddo Indians which is the heart of the Adai Caddo Cultural Center. What he discovered was a saga that chronicles the role of the Adai Caddo Indian people in American History and their involvement in establishing the Texas and Louisiana territories.