My mother passed on the family story, a legend really, that the pages of the Staige family bible on which family marriages were recorded had been glued together to conceal the record of my Shawnee ancestress. She always said it with some pride in the idea that not only were we descended from English invaders who landed at Jamestown in 1607 but also from the people who had met the boat. America , she said, was the result of their lousy immigration policy. I have never been able to confirm the tale of the Shawnee maiden though I have traced the Staige line back to the immigrant ancestor so let's just say that I am a Native American who was born in Illinois with a completely European ethnicity. I say all that to provide you with the background out of which this essay has grown. The subject is Chief Illiniwek now that our local controversy has reached the pages of this morning's New York Times.

For me the Chief is a real person. He may not be an historical person but he is as real as Pocahontas or Sacagawea - and just as fictional. I first saw the Chief in the fall of 1946 when my father took me to my first Illinois football game. Purdue was the opponent. Illinois , on their way to the Big 10 Championship and the 1947 Rose Bowl, won that game but it was the Chief that I remembered.

At half time, the Band performed its intricate marching show and then assembled into a dense formation in the North end zone and started the trademark march that was admittedly a Hollywood style American Indian rhythm. Mysteriously appearing out of the massed bands ranks the Chief danced the length of the field crossing the South goal line while the Marching Illini followed their formation spelling out I L L I N I. As he crossed under the H shaped goal posts the strutting Drum Major tossed his spinning baton up and over - scoring an extra point to cap the Chief's touchdown.

Having scored the Chief strode to midfield on the East sideline - the Illinois stands - and held up his arms for silence. He offered a calumet - the pipe of peace - to the West stands, the Visitors section. After the Alma Mater was sung the band resumed the dance and the Chief resumed his fiery dance. At the climax the band crowded around and when it resumed its formation to march off the field the Chief had disappeared as mysteriously as he had come. The Chief was never seen anywhere but at halftime and only at home games. But there was one other place he appeared, at local grade schools to teach the history of tribes that had lived in Illinois before my ancestors drove them out.

The Chief was not then a mascot nor was he then only a symbol. In the years since he has become less than a mascot - now he is a trademark, his stylized visage adorning all manner of merchandise. His place of mystery and honor has been stripped from him. It has become time for him to go in honor. It has been hard for me to accept but the Chief has been commercialized and diminished. Hail to the Chief - and farewell.