Jackson White

The Ramapough Mountain Indians (also spelled Ramapo), also known as the Ramapough Lenape Nation or Ramapough Lunaape Munsee Delaware Nation, are a group of approximately 5,000 people living around the Ramapo Mountains of Bergen and Passaic counties in northern New Jersey and Rockland County in southern New York, about 25 miles (40 km) from New York City. They were recognized in 1980 by the state of New Jersey as the Ramapough Lenape Nation but are not federally recognized. Their tribal office is located on Stag Hill Road on Houvenkopf Mountain in Mahwah, New Jersey. Since January 2007, the chief of the Ramapough Lenape Nation has been Dwaine Perry. The Ramapough Lenape Indian Nation are descendants of the Lenape, whose regional bands included the Hackensack, Tappan, Rumachenanck/Haverstroo, Munsee/Minisink, and Ramapo people. Others have claimed they descend from peoples of varying degrees of Tuscarora, African, and Dutch and other European ancestry, but lack the evidence. The Lenape language in this area was Munsee, an Algonquian dialect. The Tuscarora spoke an Iroquoian language. Following contact with European colonists, ancestors of the Ramapough Lenape Indian Nation were also known to have spoken Jersey Dutch and English. Today they speak English. The Ramapough are working to restore the Munsee language among their members. The Ramapough Lenape Nation, the Nanticoke Lenni-Lenape Tribal Nation, and the Powhatan Renape Nation have a longstanding history of working together to care for members in the state of New Jersey. As of May 2011, the three tribes formed the United State-Recognized Tribes of New Jersey.

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