The Lumbee are a Native American people primarily centered in Robeson, Hoke, Cumberland, and Scotland counties in North Carolina. They also live in surrounding states and Baltimore, Maryland. The Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina is a state-recognized tribe in North Carolina numbering approximately 55,000 enrolled members. The Lumbee take their name from the Lumber River, which winds through Robeson County. Pembroke, North Carolina, is their economic, cultural, and political center. According to the 2000 United States census report, 89% of the population of the town of Pembroke identified as Lumbee; 40% of Robeson County's population identified as Lumbee. The Lumbee Tribe was recognized by North Carolina in 1885. In 1956, the U.S. Congress passed the Lumbee Act which recognized the Lumbees as being American Indians but denied them benefits of a federally recognized tribe. History Early historical references Archaeological evidence reveals that the area now known as Robeson County (central to modern Lumbee territory) has been continuously occupied by Native people for at least 14,000 years. Every named era found elsewhere in pre-European-contact North Carolina is also present in the archaeological record of Robeson County (artifacts from Paleo-Indian, Archaic, Woodland, and Mississippian cultures). All modern vicinities of Lumbee occupation contain numerous archaeological sites as recent as the Late Woodland period (mid-1700s), and oral traditions about the history of some Lumbee families extend back as far in Robeson County as the mid-1700s. The earliest European document referring to Indian communities in the area of the Lumber River is a map prepared in 1725 by John Herbert, the English commissioner of Indian trade for the Wineau Factory on the Black River. Herbert identified the four Siouan-speaking communities as the Saraw, Pee Dee, Scavano, and Wacoma. Modern-day Lumbees claim connection to those settlements, but none of the four tribes is located within the boundaries of present-day Robeson County. When this area was first surveyed by the English in the 1750s, they reported that "No Indians" lived in Bladen County, which then included parts of present-day Robeson County. Colonial Welsh timber survey parties of the same areas also reported, "No Hostile Indians, in fact No Indians to be found at all." The adjacent Anson County was identified as "a frontier to the Indians". In 1754, colonial authorities organized the territory: everything north of the Lumber River was made part of Bladen County, and everything south of the Lumber River was made part of Anson