The stories of federal Indian boarding school survivors are living history that must be preserved. Today, I announced new agreements and funding commitments to preserve these survivor stories and experiences and share them with the world.
This section was inspired by this article: Indiana DNR to investigate deaths at Native American residential schools While the U.S Department of the Interior plans to release a report on residential schools, DNR will look closer at how many lives were lost in Indiana. Published April 4, 2022 by Madison Stacey on WTHR.com. It discusses St. Joseph's Indian Normal School in Rensselaer opened in 1888 and closed in 1896 under the direction of an enthusiastic new director from Fort Wayne, Father Joseph A. Stephan and White's Indiana Manual Labor Institute in Wabash where Quaker missionaries established White's Indiana Manual Labor Institute in Wabash three years after the Carlisle, Pennsylvania Indian school was founded. The White Institute Board of Trustees purchased more than 600 acres of land directly from the Miami tribe upon which to build a school for poor children. The first classes began on the premises in 1862, but 20 years later, the school faced financial distress.
Quakers and Native Americans: Friends Record Groups at Earlham College Libraries in Richmond, Indiana. One collection is FRG 29: White's Institute Collection The White's Institute Papers have come to Earlham from three sources. The two ledgers of financial records were among the Indiana Yearly Meeting records transferred from Richmond First Friends in 1984. Two boxes of historical papers were transferred from White's in 1992. The minutes, financial records, and other records were the gift of Horace Smith of Hagerstown, Indiana, a former board member, in 1992.
Abstract: Two boarding schools existed in the state of Indiana to educate Native American children between the ages of six and eighteen. Both schools received a government contract to teach native students which provided the institutions with money for each student they enrolled. St. Joseph’s Indian Normal School in Rensselaer operated from 1888 to 1896. White’s Indiana Manual Labor Institute in Wabash educated Native American children as part of a government contract from 1882 until 1895. These two schools were not the only institutions to educate Native American students in Indiana. However, they are the only boarding schools referenced in the literature on native tribes in Indiana and the only institutions I have found referenced which participated in a government contract to educate native children. This thesis will study both institutions during the period of their government contracts from 1882 until 1896. Copied from Indiana school days: Native American education at St. Joseph's Indian Normal School and White's Manual Labor Institute by Zemanek, Alysha Danielle in IUPUI ScholarWorks.
an overdue apology, part 1 of 5 May 2, 2012 decolonizevision on YouTube
This is the first part of a five-part project put together by students in the American Indians in Minnesota class at the University of Minnesota (AmIn 1003, Spring 2012) and explores the idea that the injustices that Native people have endured over the course of Minnesota history deserves an official state apology as a means to initiate a dialogue about what social justice for Native people might look like.
Comments invited, though comments deemed denigrating, racially disrespectful, or ad hominem will likely not be approved. We want a serious dialogue. We accept disagreement that is reasonable and thoughtful.
As the Carlisle model was more widely adopted by the U.S. government, and religious denominations continued opening schools, thousands of Indian children were often forcibly separated from their families and tribes and sent to boarding schools, sometimes far from their home reservations.
When they arrived at school, students were given English names, short haircuts, and uniforms. They were not allowed to speak their own languages, often facing punishment for doing so, and were forced to take on Christianity. Overcrowding, poor sanitary conditions, and infectious disease were common in many schools. Students often ran away in an effort to get home, and others died during their stay. In 1886 John B. Riley, Indian School Superintendent, said:
"Only by complete isolation of the Indian child from his savage antecedents can he be satisfactorily educated, and the extra expense attendant thereon is more than compensated by the thoroughness of the work."
While some Indians felt oppression and trauma from their boarding school experiences, others used the schools to their advantage and have positive memories. Indian peoples continue to remember and retell this history and seek to educate others about the variety of their experiences.
Alive to the Fire Within: Zitkála-Šá/Gertrude Simmons March 5, 2020 The Philosophical Research Society on YouTube
Her name means Red Bird, and she lived during one of the worst periods of Euro-American/Native interactions—the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Like many Native children during this dark period, Zitkála-Šá was taken to a White boarding school to have her culture replaced by the dominant one. As part of those efforts at forced assimilation, her name was changed to Gertrude Simmons, and she was forced to pray and to cut her hair. She also learned to read and write (as well as to play the violin). Zitkála-Šá thus was baptized in the ways of the American culture but used what she learned in order to maintain her beloved Dakota heritage. In the process she became a writer, political activist, teacher, intellectual, and accomplished musician. Join us to learn more about this remarkable Dakota woman and hear the power and wisdom of her writing.
About the Speaker:
Greg Salyer, Ph.D. is the President of the Philosophical Research Society. For twenty-five years, he has been an administrator and scholar in higher education institutions, but his highest calling has always been that of teacher. Trained in interdisciplinary studies, Dr. Salyer moves through the disciplines of literature, philosophy, and religious studies looking for and helping his students find practical and profound wisdom in the stories, texts, and ideas created all over the world and throughout history.
About the Series:
Voices of Wisdom from Native Cultures
The continent of what would become North America was rich with languages, religions, governments, and infrastructure. It was also rich with wisdom, a wisdom that remains despite hundreds of years of genocide, exile, and cultural appropriation. Tribes and nations that were not outright destroyed by colonialism remained and continued their traditions with creative integrations with Christianity and underground sacred experiences. Eventually, they also began to write of their new experiences in “America” as “Indians” within the context of their tribal native wisdom. The result was a chorus of profound voices that provide the continuation of their own traditions in a hostile environment, a powerful critique of colonial ideologies based in respect for all life, and unique understandings of all humans and our place in the world. Join us as we listen carefully to some of these voices through their works and to how language and landscape combine to create a unique indigenous wisdom.
Zitkala-Ša (Lakota/Lakȟótiyapi for “Red Bird”)—also known as Gertrude Simmons—was born in 1876 on the Yankton Indian Reservation in South Dakota. At eight years old, she left the reservation to attend White’s Indiana Manual Labor Institute, a missionary boarding school where her hair was cut against her will, she was forbidden to speak her Lakota/Lakȟótiyapi language, and she was forced to practice a religion she didn’t believe in. This was a common experience for thousands of Indigenous children in the wake of the Civilization Fund Act of 1819, which provided funding for missionaries and religious groups to create a system of Indian boarding schools that would forcibly assimilate Indigenous children. While she took interest in some of the experiences in her new environment, such as learning the violin, she resisted the institutional efforts to assimilate her into European American culture—actions she protested through a lifetime of writing and political activism. When she returned home to her reservation, Zitkala-Ša chronicled an anthology of oral Dakota stories published as “Old Indian Legends” in 1901. The book was among the first works to bring traditional Indigenous American stories to a wider audience. Zitkala-Ša was also a gifted musician. In 1913, she wrote the text and songs for the first Indigenous American opera, The Sun Dance, based on one her peoples ceremonies.”
One of the most successful Native Americans to attend White's Institute, at Treaty, was Zitkala-Sa translated Red Bird, English name Gertrude Simmons Bonnin (1876-1938). She was a Yankton Indian sent to Whites attending from 1884 to 1887 and in 1891 returned to White's. At one time she even taught music there. Went on to Earlham at Richmond, In. In 1899 taught at Carlislie Industrial School in Pennsylvania. Wrote for magazines and a book American Indian Stories. She became one of the most important native American reformers in the early pan-Indian movement, helping to form the National Council of American Indians. She wrote an interesting autobiography which left an account of her time in Wabash County. One book is The Flight of Red Bird the Life of Zitkala-sa by Doreen Rappaport, Dial Books NY, copyright 1997 ISBN 0-8037-1438-6. I'll bet you could find it on Amazon. Also available is Zitkala-sa American Indian Stories, Legends, and other Writings by Cathy Davidson and Ada Norris Penguin classics copyright 2003. Helen Shanks shares this note “Grandpa Gibney was Trustee. He would take Indian children to Whites In, after feeding , bathing and clean clothing for them” Mother told me this.”
Ian Walls. "St. Joseph's Indian Normal School." Clio: Your Guide to History. May 7, 2017. Accessed April 11, 2022. https://theclio.com/entry/39168, has photos and map, 2022.
Indiana Division of Historic Preservation and Archaeology, “St. Joseph Indian Normal School,” Discover Indiana, accessed April 11, https://publichistory.iupui.edu/items/show/362 has photo and map.
St. Joseph's Indian Normal School, 1888-1896 by Dominic B. Gerlach in Indiana Magazine of History, Vol. 69, No. 1 (MARCH 1973), pp. 1-42 (42 pages), Published By: Indiana University Press, Indiana Magazine of History, https://www.jstor.org/stable/27789868
White's Institute: A Glimpse into its Past and Present 25 page booklet in the Indiana State Library Digital Collections. The Description states: This booklet provides the history of Josiah White and his manual labor institutes for children. This focuses on the one in Wabash County, Indiana, founded in the early 1850s. It has general history of the institute, photographs, a list of the trustees for 1929, and a list of superintendents and matrons.
White's Institute Cemetery INGenWeb. An old burying ground no longer used located on the White's Institute grounds. White's at one time was an Indian Manual School. The burials are from this period of time. The cemetery is located within the boundaries of Whites Institute and are beautifully situated and well maintained. This listing was done by Ron Woodward and is included in his book "Noble township Cemeteries Wabash County Indiana", 2004. Besides using gravestone records, obituaries and Admissions and Dismissal Records of Whites Indian Manual Labor Institute were used.
Indian School: Site of first Indian agricultural school in West, established 1804 by Philip Dennis for the Society of Friends, at the request of Chiefs Little Turtle and Five Medals. Destroyed 1812. Later site of Indian trade. Location: US 24, near Huntington / Wabash County line (Huntington County, Indiana). Marker No Longer Standing. Installed: Erected by Huntington County Rural Youth Club ID#: 35.1950.1, by Indiana Historical Bureau.
A 2002 movie Rabbit-Proof Fence is based on the book "Follow the Rabbit-Proof Fence". In 1931, three half-white, half-Aboriginal girls escape after being plucked from their houses to be trained as domestic staff, and set off on a journey across the Outback. Copied from imdb.com.
A 2012 documentary We Were Children documents Canadian Residental Schools: For over 130 years till 1996, more than 100,000 of Canada's First Nations children were legally required to attend government-funded schools run by various Christian faiths. There were 80 of these 'residential schools' across the country. Most children were sent to faraway schools that separated them from their families and traditional land. Copied from imdb.com.
In the late 19th century, the federal government worked in tandem with religious organizations to send hundreds of Native American children to two off-reservation boarding schools in Indiana.
Now, the Indiana Department of Natural Resources is investigating whether there could be more victims who remain unaccounted for across the state.
The report details how the U.S. worked with churches to Christianize Native American boarding schools as part of a project to sever them from their culture, their identities and ultimately their land.
An NHPRC grant to the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition will support a project to digitize 20,000 pages of records (1852-1945) related to at least nine Quaker-operated boarding schools from six states held in the collections at Swarthmore College and Haverford College. This group of records are from Quaker-operated boarding schools and Quaker organizations include enrollment papers, financial information, correspondence, administrative records, and photographs.
The project is part of a larger national effort to document approximately 500 government-funded Indian day and boarding schools operated in the United States during the 19th and 20th centuries. The mission of the National Native American Boarding School Hearing Coalition is to lead in the pursuit of understanding and addressing the ongoing trauma created by the U.S. Indian Boarding School policy. For more information, go to https://boardingschoolhealing.org/
Shown here are Quaker teachers, families, and students at the Ottawa School, Indian Territory, 1872. Courtesy of the Quaker Collection at Haverford College.
From the early 1800s through the 1960s, Christian churches collaborated with the government to create hundreds of boarding schools for Native American children. #Quakers were both complicit and active participants in this horrific era.
FCNL enthusiastically supports these efforts, as they will only strengthen our collective advocacy for #Congress to pass the the Truth and Healing Commission on Indian Boarding School bill.
Only by complete isolation of the Indian child from his savage antecedents can he be satisfactorily educated, and the extra expense attendant thereon is more than compensated by the thoroughness of the work. Bottom right side under Boarding Schools.
Page LXI, (68 of 635) Annual report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs to the Secretary of the Interior by United States. Bureau of Indian Affairs, Publication date 1869 on Archive.org.
After annihilation and dispossession failed, the effort to “Americanize” Indians through the federal boarding-school system targeted every tribe in the country—a vast family-separation policy that deliberately deracinated generations of children. As one Indian school superintendent wrote in a report, “Only by complete isolation of the Indian child from his savage antecedents can he be satisfactorily educated.” From 1819 to 1969, the United States took hundreds of thousands of children away from their parents, sending them to four hundred and eight schools across thirty-seven states. By 1926, more than eighty per cent of school-age Indian children had been removed from their families.
The schools where those children studied were marked, from their founding, by reports of disease, physical abuse, sexual violence, and financial exploitation, as students were forced to work for neighboring farmers, homesteaders, and businesses. At least five hundred children died while attending the schools, and at least fifty-three of the schools have burial sites, filled with the bodies of children who were never returned to their families. An extensive network of religious institutions also participated in these travesties: the Catholic Church operated more than a hundred Indian boarding schools; dozens of others were run by the Society of Friends, the Presbyterian Church, the United Methodist Church, the Unitarian Church, and the Episcopal Church. The founder of the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, in Pennsylvania, one of the earliest federal institutions, told a conference of social reformers, “All the Indian there is in the race should be dead. Kill the Indian in him, and save the man.”
From the USA Today (https://www.usatoday.com/.../indian-boarding.../73836125007/ ), a story on the launch of the National Indian Boarding School Digital Archive, a national digital platform and digital repository for Native American day and boarding school archival collections throughout the United States.
The NHPRC has funded the national effort to document approximately 500 government-funded Indian day and boarding schools operated in the United States during the 19th and 20th centuries.
The mission of the National Native American Boarding School Hearing Coalition is to lead in the pursuit of understanding and addressing the ongoing trauma created by the U.S. Indian Boarding School policy. For more information, go to https://boardingschoolhealing.org/
