Mayor To Meet With Tribal Leader Over Braintree Wamps Mascot

BRAINTREE, MA — Mayor Charles Kokoros said he will meet with head of the Massachusetts Native American tribe of Ponkapoag later this week to discuss Braintree High School's mascot, the Wamps.

At Monday's School Committee meeting, Kokoros told the committee he spoke on the phone with Tribe Sagamore Faries Gray. Kokoros admitted he already learned a lot during the call and said he looks forward to meeting Gray.

"I am going to do whatever I can to become educated on the issue and work with Faries Gray to work on the best possible outcome and solution," Kokoros said.

Gray does not support the high school's use of the Wamp mascot. He said Native Americans don't feel honored by indigenous mascots. Instead, they feel like trophies.

The mascot comes from Chief Josiah Wampatuck, leader of the Mattakeesett tribe. In 1665, Wampatuck signed the Braintree Indian Deed, giving colonists the land that is now Braintree, Quincy, Holbrook and Randolph. The deed remains in the town clerk's office.

The Braintree School Committee has received two petitions, one demanding the mascot be changed, and another urging the school to keep the logo. Kokoros said he also received e-mails from high school students and alumni on the issue.

As of Tuesday afternoon, more than 6,900 people have signed the petition to rename the Braintree High School mascot. Petition creator Lauren Kaye called the school's nickname and logo "extremely distasteful."

"Every year, students dress up in feathered costumes and face paint, running through the halls replicating 'Native American chants,'" Kaye wrote. "These racist practices are unacceptable, yet continue to be allowed and encouraged by the use of this mascot."

Around 2,800 people have signed a counter-petition in support of keeping the "Wamp" mascot.

"Save the culture and history of the Braintree Wamps," petition creator Matt Curtin said. "Where students and athletes take pride in being a Wamp, in which they do not intend to be racist and disrespectful. Once a Wamp Always a Wamp."

The School Committee will go through a thorough process to review the high school's mascot, but committee member Jennifer Aborn Dolan said that won't start until after Kokoros' meeting with Gray.

"We feel it's appropriate to let that meeting happen before we fully establish and rollout the process we will use to review the mascot," Dolan said.