Feast's a Thanksgiving history lesson

Carle Place brothers Matthew and Nick Costello, 10 and 15, practiced hurling bamboo rods with spear-throwers.

Justin and Collin Ruggeberg, 8 and 9, of Huntington, also brothers, roasted meat chunks over an open fire.

Lilia Guizatoullina, 7, of Syosset, enjoyed a savory, slow-cooked corn soup.

They were among hundreds of Long Islanders who flocked Sunday to the Garvies Point Museum & Preserve's annual Native American Thanksgiving Feast and learned to hunt, cook and, yes, eat in the same ways native New Yorkers would have centuries ago.

"They have good food here," said Justin, who attended the Glen Cove event with his family and Cub Scout Pack 178. "They just cook everything over the fire: chicken, squash, jerky."

The jerky, hung to dry near the fire, was made of beef, but long ago would have more likely been "venison, bear, whatever you've got," said museum docent Jeff Gottlieb, 53, of Massapequa.

The Thanksgiving feast, which the museum has hosted for more than 25 years, "brings history to life," said Justin and Collin's father, Brian Ruggeberg.

It also helps to shatter stereotypes about American Indians, said Cliff Matias, 40, a member of the Kichwa/Taino nation and cultural director of the Brooklyn-based Redhawk Native American Arts Council, which performed dances and led discussions Sunday.

"It's good to try to break that Thanksgiving myth and move away from the story of Indians and pilgrims," Matias said, adding that educational programs such as those at the museum provide greater insight into the struggles -- past and current -- of what he called indigenous peoples.

Even the question of what to call American Indians was raised Sunday. "I call them 'First Americans,' because we're all immigrants," said Tom Natale, 67, of Sea Cliff, a museum docent. "We have to educate, not speculate."