Exhibits > Tsutukwanah >
Introduction
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Through the Eyes of Tsutukwanah
Reservation Shoshone, 1868-1945
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Introduction
by Peter Iverson
On the
3rd of July in 1868, Washakie signed one of the final formal treaties
executed between an American Indian community and the United States
government. The Fort Bridger treaty established reservation boundaries
of over three million acres, enveloping the Warm Valley region that
the Shoshone leader particularly prized. Following the usual stipulations
in such documents, the treaty also called for the Shoshones to farm,
to send their children to school, and to be peaceful. The government
pledged assistance with farming and promised schools for the children.
The treaty marked the end of an era, and the beginning of a new age.
As people from the Shoshone community pondered the treaty and this
assignment of country, they may well have had somewhat different
emotions than some of the other Indian nations of the West at this
time. For the more numerous and militarily more powerful Lakotas,
the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868 seemingly had guaranteed forever
their rights to the sacred Black Hills. But the treaty quickly became
pieces of paper without weight or meaning. The discovery of gold
in the Black Hills soon prompted a forced agreement in 1876 and
the sacred ground was lost. Elsewhere in the West Indian peoples
often found themselves on a small portion of the land they had once
controlled or removed entirely from the territory they had particularly
cherished. By contrast, the Shoshones were where they wanted to
be, even if they merited more land than they had ultimately obtained.
Nonetheless, the treaty could be viewed as a triumph rather than
as a capitulation.
If the initial land base signaled at least a partial victory, then
it would be a victory carefully safeguarded in the future. At Wind
River, the Shoshones soon had to share their reservation with the
Northern Arapahos. A decade after the Fort Bridger Treaty, there
were now two Indian communities. Washakie and other Shoshone leaders
objected in vain to this arrangement; it did not make things easier
in a beautiful but demanding land.
The central piece of legislation designed to achieve such goals
is known as the General Allotment Act of 1887, or the Dawes Act,
after its sponsor in Congress, Senator Henry Dawes of Massachusetts.
Under the terms of the act, the government could authorize that
a reservation be divided into 160-acre parcels, following the model
of the Homestead Act of 1862. Federal agents were empowered to choose
allotments for any heads of household or single adults who declined
this offer. “Surplus” land left over after this forced
division could be sold. In one swoop, private property had been
encouraged, reservations usually were reduced in size, and non-Indian
interests were satisfied.
Not all reservations were allotted, but the Indian people of the
northern plains bore the brunt of this ill-advised initiative. Because
their lands were seen as more promising for farming and ranching,
and because larger numbers of Anglo-Americans were already on hand
within this region, Indians in the northern plains lost more land
through this process than did, for example, their Native counterparts
in the Southwest. Allotment often left Plains Indian reservations
a checkerboard of various interests—individually-held land,
tribal land, and over time, lands leased to or owned by outsiders.
With each generation, such a pattern became more disastrous. The
splintering of inherited parcels inspired family divisions and progressively
smaller pieces of land that became impossible to agree upon or use
productively. The seeds of reservation underdevelopment within the
area clearly were sown at this time.
In addition to the specter of allotment, the people of Wind River
as well as other reservations faced the continuing threat of land
cession. At Standing Rock, Cheyenne River, Rosebud, Yakima, and
Crow, federal negotiators made the journey to try to pry portions
of reservation lands away from the people. The same drama took place
at Wind River. The Brunot cession of 1872 relinquished southern
lands where gold had been discovered. This was later compensated
for and money from the settlement helped Indian people start their
own cow herds. Twenty-four years later, ten square miles were subtracted
from the hot springs area, including the site of the aptly named
Thermopolis.
Two rather different forces pushed for further reduction of the
Indian estate after the United States Congress declared in 1871
that no more treaties were to be signed. First, at a time in the
West when most other lands had been claimed for farming, ranching,
lumbering, and mining, existing Indian land bases were tempting
targets for non-Indian Westerners who wanted to expand their land
holdings or for newcomers or prospective migrants who wanted to
regenerate their fortunes within the region. As they had heard before
in their history, Native Americans listened to a continuing refrain
that they had more land than they needed and they did not know how
to use fully and efficiently the acreage they possessed. Western
representatives in Congress and federal officials wanted to satisfy
their constituents and saw in Indian reservations a chance to placate
these clamoring folks.
In addition, individuals who labeled themselves as “friends
of the Indians” (Native peoples around the world have learned
to duck whenever they hear versions of “I am your friend.”)
argued that the answer to improving the Indian conditions lay in
treating individuals and communities just like everybody else. Influenced
by what seemed like a comparable dilemma of assimilating immigrants
from around the world, reformers began to gather annually at a hotel
at Lake Mohonk in the Hudson River valley in New York to address
the situation and to offer suggestions for specific change. They
and others of similar conviction shared the perspectives of this
time. Therefore they lobbied for private property, Christianity,
agriculture, and universal education as keys to unlocking the Indian
future in America. Above all, they contended, Indians should become
individuals—freed from what were perceived as the shackles
of tribal loyalties and the limitations of what critics usually
referred to as “camp life.”
The central piece of legislation designed to achieve such goals
is known as the General Allotment Act of 1887, or the Dawes Act,
after its sponsor in Congress, Senator Henry Dawes of Massachusetts.
Under the terms of the act, the government could authorize that
a reservation be divided into 160-acre parcels, following the model
of the Homestead Act of 1862. Federal agents were empowered to choose
allotments for any heads of household or single adults who declined
this offer. “Surplus” land left over after this forced
division could be sold. In one swoop, private property had been
encouraged, reservations usually were reduced in size, and non-Indian
interests were satisfied.
Not all reservations were allotted, but the Indian people of the
northern plains bore the brunt of this ill-advised initiative. Because
their lands were seen as more promising for farming and ranching,
and because larger numbers of Anglo-Americans were already on hand
within this region, Indians in the northern plains lost more land
through this process than did, for example, their Native counterparts
in the Southwest. Allotment often left Plains Indian reservations
a checkerboard of various interests—individually-held land,
tribal land, and over time, lands leased to or owned by outsiders.
With each generation, such a pattern became more disastrous. The
splintering of inherited parcels inspired family divisions and progressively
smaller pieces of land that became impossible to agree upon or use
productively. The seeds of reservation underdevelopment within the
area clearly were sown at this time.
In addition to the specter of allotment, the people of Wind River
as well as other reservations faced the continuing threat of land
cession. At Standing Rock, Cheyenne River, Rosebud, Yakima, and
Crow, federal negotiators made the journey to try to pry portions
of reservation lands away from the people. The same drama took place
at Wind River. The Brunot cession of 1872 relinquished southern
lands where gold had been discovered. This was later compensated
for and money from the settlement helped Indian people start their
own cow herds. Twenty-four years later, ten square miles were subtracted
from the hot springs area, including the site of the aptly named
Thermopolis.
The federal emissary of 1896 returned in 1904. That ubiquitous
government employee James McLaughlin surfaced once again, armed
with a U.S. Supreme Court decision of the previous year. The Lone
Wolf v. Hitchcock decision of 1903 concluded that Congress did not
need to consult a reservation community prior to reducing its land
base, regardless of treaty or agreement language. Despite the articulate
protests of tribal representatives, McLaughlin’s persistence
was rewarded finally with a cession of a major portion of the reserve.
However, the cession depended upon non-Indian settlers coming in
and purchasing the land. Slow development of irrigation facilities
and the gradual diminution of interest in such arid, high country
lands eventually worked to the advantage of Wind River’s reservation
people. Most of the land given up through the 1904 negotiations
would be officially restored to the reservation by the 1930s.
Through this period, then, Shoshones had to endure the nagging
uncertainty of the status of their lands. Some allotment and some
cessions significantly reduced the size of the overall reservation.
In 1932, in the Indian Court of Claims, the Shoshone tribe was awarded
approximately $4 million for the settlement of the Arapaho on their
reservation. Thereafter, the Shoshones agreed to share an undivided
and equal interest in the trust property of the reservation with
the Arapaho.
In the meantime they had to make their way in this fragile period.
The oral interviews conducted for the Warm Valley Historical Project
speak to people doing the best they could with what they had. As
Marie Washakie, born in 1910, states succinctly, “We had to
do the best we can in those days.” She remembers her grandmother’s
big garden, a productive plot that allowed them to sell watermelons
to others. Bullberries, chokecherries and other fruit could be gathered
to supplement the diet, while roots could be used for medicinal
purposes. Corn, rutabagas, turnips, cabbage, and chickens were raised
for family consumption and taken to the gambling halls for sale.
Many of those interviewed recalled canning and drying vegetables
as well as hunting sage chickens and what scant game was available.
Shoshone farmers also raised alfalfa and wheat, although mostly
for their own use.
In addition to the challenge of feeding their families, people
faced the dilemma of nurturing families and keeping them together.
Despite the rigors of hauling water, living in housing that did
not always provide full shelter from the cold and wind of a long
Wyoming winter, and other comparable hurdles, individuals and families
apparently showed great resolve. Lillian Hereford’s memory
of the importance of grandparents and the degree of family stability
prior World War II no doubt would be echoed by many others. In a
time of more subsistence farming and less reliance on wage work
or per capita payments, families may have often functioned somewhat
differently and have encouraged a high degree of interdependence.
Nellie Washakie and a number of others attested to the necessity
of hard work and the double-edged sword of greater reliance on wage
work and “per caps.”
Locally and nationally the question of religion demonstrated the
transitional nature of the period prior to the New Deal. Initially
Christian churches were perceived solely as agents of conversion.
Although Catholic and Protestant missions remained naturally committed
to that goal, in time the process became altered at some churches.
Mission priests and ministers could remain in a particular reservation
community for a long time and fail to appreciate Native art, language
and tradition. Some defined their role narrowly and rigidly, based
on their negative attitudes toward such elements of Indian culture.
Such an attitude did not preclude the acquisition of converts, but
it could limit the number of them. In making a tentative or permanent
choice to join a parish or congregation, individual Indians had
to weigh a number of loyalties, instincts, and emotions. If the
change become too personalized, if it meant a total break from older
relatives, for example, then for many the decision became too traumatic.
Over time some priests and ministers who had resided for some years
in a certain place began to alter their view of their responsibilities
and their overall objectives. At St. Michael’s Mission on the
Navajo reservation, the Franciscan fathers under the leadership
of Father Berard Haile published an ethnological dictionary of Navajo
life and a number of studies of Navajo ceremonies. Father Berard
became recognized as a leading authority on Navajo culture. Other
examples could be cited from our own time, with the Episcopalian
priest Father Peter John Powell completing major works on the history
and culture of the Northern Cheyennes. Mission churches also began,
in some instances, to employ Indian artists to decorate the interior
of churches and chapels with identifiably Native emblems and symbols.
Not all immigrant children went to school. Others attended for a
time and then drifted on or were compelled to enter the world of
work. In the American South, Black students were kept out of schools
designated solely for White children; separate but hardly equal
facilities offered a more limited curriculum. In the guise of offering
practical training, schools channeled students toward carpentry
rather than chemistry. And while there was always a need for a certain
number of carpenters, there could be little doubt that the Black
physicians, attorneys, and other prospective professionals were
denied their futures.
Another important form of worship emerged at the turn of the century
with the rapid growth of interest and participation in the Native
American Church. Employing the ritual use of the peyote cactus,
this church represented a blend of Christian and aboriginal symbolism,
belief and practice. However, it clearly mirrored the interest in
creating a new faith for a new day and one designed for Indians
themselves. For Indian men, denied the glory of war and the responsibility
of hunting, the church offered roles and brotherhood. Although bitterly
opposed by some missionaries and some adherents to traditional tribal
ceremonialism, the Native American Church had established itself
on most Plains reservations by 1920. Wind River fits this pattern.
Eva Enos, born in 1914, remembers peyote meetings when she was a
little girl, the tipis erected near St. Michael’s Mission in
Ethete and elsewhere.
In the 1930s the arrival of the New Deal and the appointment of
John Collier as Commissioner of Indian Affairs marked a changing
outlook at the federal level. Commissioner Collier embraced cultural
pluralism. He believed that Indians were entitled to freedom of
religion, to speak their own languages, and to promote their arts
and crafts. Collier surely merits criticism for his administration’s
imposition of livestock reduction programs on some reservations
as well as majority-ruled tribal councils which ran against the
grain of older forms of decision-making. On balance, though, the
1930s under Collier’s committed leadership represented a turning
away from the most severe forms of assimilationist philosophy about
land and culture. Try as it might following World War II to reverse
itself, the Bureau of Indian Affairs could not return to the pre-Collier
era. Indian reservations and thus Indian communities would not vanish.
As a number of people interviewed for the Warm Valley Historical
Project reveal, things have not been easy since the war. Old and
new problems are present. As do elders in all cultures, the people
interviewed for the project have mixed emotions about what the passage
of time has brought. As do other Americans, they welcome some of
the material comforts that are more in evidence today. As do other
Native Americans, they note more rodeos and pow-wows as examples
of community spirit and vitality.
They may not address it directly, but the women and men interviewed
also must take considerable pride and satisfaction in the very survival
of Wind River. When the Shoshones won the Warm Valley through the
treaty negotiations of 1868, few people outside the tribe would
have believed that a century-and-a-quarter later the Shoshones would
remain on their land. That they have persisted, that they have succeeded,
that they have triumphed in this way is remarkable. It is a tribute
at Wind River and in other Native American communities to the mostly
anonymous women, men and children who forged a new way of life under
the most trying of circumstances. One imagines they would tell James
McLaughlin as well as Washakie: We are still here. We will always
be here. This is still our home.
After World War II, handy cameras and candid snap shots became
the order of the day. At this time surviving cultural characteristics
unique to different ethnic communities tended to become guarded,
more relegated to the private realm and less subject to public display.
The average tourist or professional photographer seeing Indians
in blue jeans with short hair, speaking English and riding in pickups
instead of on horses found them significantly less exotic than their
forefathers, in general too ordinary to document or photograph.
What distinctive characteristics might be visible were also often
too subtle for most outsiders to perceive.
Photographs of reservation life, thus, became a largely private
matter with their domain as the family album or the living room
wall. Someday, however, these too may offer invaluable, and in some
cases, perhaps, the only means of access and understanding to a
world that is rapidly changing
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