The American Indian Boarding
School Experience, 1875-1928


A diaphanously and precarious clad America floats westward thru the air with the  "star of the empire"
on her forehead.  She has left the cities of the East behind, and the wide Mississippi, and still her course
is westward.  In her right hand she carries a school book--testimonial of the national enlightenment,
while in her left she trails the slender wires of the telegraph that will bind the nation.  Fleeing her
approach are the Indians, buffalo, wild horses, bears and other game, disappearing into the storm and
waves of the Pacific coast. They flee the wondrous vision -- the star "is too much for them."
--PRÉCIS OF A CONTEMPORARY DESCRIPTION OF THIS PAINTING BY
GEORGE CROFUTT WHO DISTRIBUTED HIS ENGRAVING OF IT WIDELY.

Related Websites

http://longman.awl.com/history/primarysource_17_1.htm
Read an excerpt from Helen Hunt Jackson's A Century of Dishonor, a plea for granting Indians property
rights and citizenship that the author sent to every member of Congress at her own expense.

http://www.duke.edu/~ehs1/education/index.html
Duke University Professor Peter Wood has assembled   documents on 19th century Native American
education.   The site includes links to photographs and transcribed letters.

http://content.lib.washington.edu/aipnw/marr/footnote.html#foot2
http://content.lib.washington.edu/aipnw/marr/routine.html
This nice site was put together by Seattle librarian Carolyn J. Marr.  It focuses on
boarding schools in the Pacific Northwest.  The site contains lots of photos. The typical daily routine
shows just how regimented boarding school life was.

http://ewu69072.ewu.edu/ets/315board.html
This  exhibit from Eastern Washington University     contains facts and photos on several reservation
boarding and missionary schools.

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/if_you_knew/if_you_knew_05.html
The   National Library of Medicine      maintains a site with information and photographs concerning
the poor health conditions at the Indian boarding schools.

http://www.pond.com/~sonjakeo/rezsch.html
This personal web page contains a decidedly    pro-Indian  viewpoint.  The links to related sites are interesting.

http://www.canoe.ca/CNEWSFeatures9904/28_indians.html
Associated Press writer Matt Kelley's article    American Indian boarding schools: 'That hurt never
goes away' recounts the experiences of several Indian boarding school students from more recent
(circa 1950s) times.

http://www.omaha.com/Omaha/OWH/StoryViewer/1,3153,302122,00.html
More stories of boarding school experiences.

http://www.sixkiller.com/book/start.html
http://www.sixkiller.com/book/chapter2.html
The full text of   Sisters in the Blood: The Education of Women in Native America      is available
online and provides information on the modern Native American woman's experience.
Chapter 2 provides a good overview of the history and politics of Indian education in America.

http://indy4.fdl.cc.mn.us/~isk/stories/authors/bonnin.html
The  biography of Native American author Gertrude Bonnin    (aka Zitkala Sha) from the UVA E-books
project.  Bonnin was a critic of the boarding school movement, and managed never to attend one herself.
 

This page created by Karen T. Goebel   for EDLF 761, July 2000


Back to the goebelfamily main page