Native Past

Olivia Renee Studio, LLC

Contains adsIn-app purchases

About this app

Native Past teaches the history, stories, and living languages of Native American nations — and connects you to the original records that hold your family's names.

FIFTEEN NATIONS, IN THE PRESENT TENSE
173 illustrated history chapters across 15 nations: the Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Muscogee (Creek) and Seminole; the Navajo, Hopi and Apache; the Lakota, Dakota, Comanche, Kiowa and Osage; the Ojibwe and the Haudenosaunee. Written in the present tense, because these nations are here now. Notable figures, traditional stories, and a source citation on every item.

LEARN THE LANGUAGES
187 gentle lessons and 950+ verified words and phrases across the 12 nations with courses. Each course begins with the writing system — the Cherokee syllabary, the Osage script, the Choctaw alphabet — then teaches everyday vocabulary. Every lesson teaches its words before it quizzes them, and review practice is always no-stakes. Where the sources can't yet support a course, a nation is included for its history alone rather than guessed at.

SEARCH 248,000+ ARCHIVAL RECORDS
The Dawes Rolls and eleven more record sets from the U.S. National Archives, free and searchable — family census cards, enrollment categories, the applicants other indexes leave out, and a link to every original document. Names appear exactly as the Archives transcribed them; where a field was never transcribed we leave it blank and link to the card rather than guess.

YOUR FAMILY DOCUMENTS, PRIVATE BY DESIGN
Import photos and PDFs of your own family records. The app reads them on your device, finds names, roll numbers and card numbers, and maps the connections between documents. Build a family tree and attach the proof to any person. Nothing you import is ever uploaded — your documents, tree and notes stay on your device and in your own device backups.

WORKS OFFLINE, IN 33 LANGUAGES
All history and language content ships with the app and works with no connection. Outside English the content is machine-translated and labeled as such, with English always available underneath.

CITED, NOT CLAIMED
Every chapter, figure, word and phrase carries its sources. The content is compiled from public, educational material — nothing sacred or restricted. Native Past is an independent educational research aid: not affiliated with or endorsed by the National Archives or any tribal government, and never an authority on enrollment or citizenship, which the nations determine for themselves.

FREE & PRO
• Free: everything above, with occasional ads.
• Pro ($0.99/month or $5.99/year): removes all ads and supports ongoing content work.

Native Past Pro is an auto-renewing subscription billed through your Google Play account. It renews automatically unless cancelled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. Manage or cancel it any time under Subscriptions in the Google Play Store.

What’s new

First release.

History and language courses for 15 Native nations, a free search of 248,000+ National Archives records, and a private on-device space for your own family documents and family tree.