McKenzie planned a symbolic event with national press coverage and worked with Arthur C. Parker to recruit speakers, design the conference program and secure endorsements from the Bureau of Indian Affairs, City of Columbus, Ohio State University and several local civic and religious organizations. The response was positive. Impressed with the historical significance of the April meeting, Ohio State President William Oxley Thompson, Columbus Mayor George Sidney Marshall, as well as by the President of the Chamber of Commerce, the President of the Ministerial Association, the Secretary of the YMCA, the Secretary of the State Historical and Archaeological Society, and the President of the Columbus Federation of Labor invited the new American Indian Association to hold their first national conference in Columbus, on Columbus Day, October, 1911. "Word has come to our ears that you are planning to meet in national assembly for the first time in history to discuss the problems which devolve upon the Indian race, and we, therefore, hasten to invite you to light the camp-fire first in the city named for the first white man who visited these shores. Let us, if we may, forget any animosities of the past, and jointly work for those conditions and those policies which in the future will justify peace because based upon the principles of equity, intelligence and progress. The high position which your leaders are reaching make us eager to welcome the representatives of all the tribes in the name of Ohio State University, the City of Columbus, and the civic and religious bodies of our city." The invitation was accepted and a call issued for a national conference.