AMHERST - The mass of cars parked near the Monacan Tribal Center displayed license plates from Virginia, Maryland, Tennessee and West Virginia.

From as far away as Texas, members of the Monacan Indian Nation traveled to Amherst County for Saturday’s annual homecoming celebration.

The event is part reunion and part fundraiser.

This year it was also billed as part of a three-day conference based in Williamsburg about the survival of Virginia’s Indians.

About 30 event participants traveled by bus to the Monacan homecoming celebration. In the past days, participants traveled to five other Virginia tribal centers and attended an educational symposium in Colonial Williamsburg about Indian culture, history and modern-day struggles.

Despite the morning rain and soggy afternoon, people lingered in and around the community hall exchanging hugs, food and stories.

“Coming here is ... like coming home,“ said Ronnie Durie, an Amherst County resident whose wife is a member of the Monacan Indian Nation. “I love it down here. It’s very peaceful. It’s a focal point for most of the Monacan people to come to.“

Throughout the afternoon, people purchased crafts; canned fruits and vegetables; and baked goods to benefit St. Paul’s Episcopal Mission Church. At 1 p.m., an auction began to benefit the Monacan Indian Scholarship Fund.

Chief Kenneth Branham said supporting their members’ higher education and retraining efforts is a priority for the tribe. For many years, Indians in Virginia were excluded from the commonwealth’s education system - welcomed at neither the white nor black public schools.

Branham, 53, said he was one of the first in his community to graduate from an Amherst County High School.

“It was a very hard time here in Virginia for our elders,“ Branham said.

“If it hadn’t been for the local churches, Virginia Indians probably wouldn’t have had any education.“

R.G. Bryant, a member of the Kiowa tribe who lives in Amherst County, started the education auction 14 years ago. He said he wanted to give back to the Monacan community that welcomed him when he moved from Missouri about 20 years ago.

“It’s kind of a way of giving back for all the good fortune I’ve had in life,“ Bryant said.

“Through education, we get equal footing with the dominant society. If we’re not educated, we become defeated.“

Branham said their fundraising goal from the auction is $10,000. The big ticket item: a seven-year-old registered American Paint Horse that was sold for $1,800.

David Lamb, who donated the horse, runs the Oakland Heights Farm in Gordonsville. Although Lamb lives only a short drive from Amherst County, he met members of the Monacan Indian Nation during a recent trip to England.

Lamb was overseas for a horse conference while members of Virginia’s eight state-recognized tribes traveled to Kent as part of the Jamestown 2007 celebrations.

“I’ve been lucky,“ Lamb said. “I’ve been in the horse business a long time and I’ve never found an act of kindness ever wasted.“

The homecoming celebration was the closing event for the Williamsburg conference, which was sponsored by Jamestown 2007 as a signature event.

Sarah Graves, a sixth-grade school teacher with Halifax County Public Schools, attended all three days of the conference. She said she attended to learn more about the role Virginia Indians played in the success of Western colonizers. She plans to use that history in a spring production of Shakespeare’s “The Tempest,“ which she plans to set in Jamestown.

“(This event) sort of grounded me in the fact that here is a rich history that was not being told and is just now beginning to be told,“ Graves said. “And people are listening.“

Goldstein is a staff writer for The News & Advance in Lynchburg.