In her novel The Conquest: The True Story of the Lewis and Clark, suffragette Eva Emery Dye recasts the legend of Sacagawea (Sacajawea), the Shoshone woman who accompanied the Lewis and Clark Expedition (see entry for APRIL 1804), to represent her as an emblem of a modern independent woman. Although Dye bases much of her book on the original journals of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, she inaccurately elevates Sacagawea’s role from a valued interpreter to a guide whose skills were responsible for the expedition’s success.
The Reclamation Act calls for the irrigation of western lands.
Sponsored by Francis G. Newlands of Nevada, the Reclamation Act establishes the Reclamation Service, an agency authorized to build irrigation projects in 16 western states. The areas designated for development include large areas of Indian-held lands. As these lands become irrigated and thus more attractive to non-Indians, Indian control over them will be increasingly threatened.
Charles A. Eastman’s My Indian Boyhood is published.
A graduate of Dartmouth and Boston College, physician and reformer Charles A. Eastman tells the story of his traditional Dakota Sioux upbringing in My Indian Boyhood. The memoir is the first in a series of stories and books Eastman will write for a non-Indian readership with the aim of promoting respect for Indian cultures.
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“Almost every evening a myth, or a true story of some deed done in the past, was narrated by one of the parents or grandparents, while the boy listened with parted lips and glistening eyes. On the following evening he was usually required to repeat it. If he was not an apt scholar, he struggled long with his task; but, as a rule, the Indian boy was a good listener and had a good memory, so that the stories were tolerably well mastered. The household became his audience, by which he was alternately criticized and applauded.”
—Dakota Sioux author Charles A. Eastman in My Indian Boyhood (1902)
Creek satirist Alexander Posey begins writing the Fus Fixico Letters.
A noted poet and editor of the Indian Journal, Alexander Posey begins work on a collection of letters, supposedly written by a fictional character named Fus Fixico, about life in the Creek Nation. Using caricatures of actual leaders and other prominent Creeks, the Fus Fixico letters satirize Creek politics and humorously explore controversial issues such as Allotment and the pending incorporation of Indian Territory into the state of Oklahoma.
Indian men are ordered to cut their hair.
To accelerate assimilation, the commissioner of Indian affairs orders Indian agents to prohibit Indian males from wearing their hair long. Traditionally, long hair was a source of pride among young Indian men. If any Indians refuse to comply, the commissioner recommends withholding annuities due to them by treaty.
Crazy Snake leader Chitto Harjo is imprisoned.
Because of their refusal to disband the Crazy Snake movement (see entry for JANUARY 27, 1901), Creek radical leader Chitto Harjo and nine other Crazy Snakes are arrested and sent to the federal penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas. Harjo will remain imprisoned for nine months, during which time his followers begin to abandon their militant stance and seek political positions on the Creek tribal council.
The “Dead Indian Act” allows for the sale of inherited allotments.
The General Allotment Act (see entry for FEB RUARY 8, 1887) forbade Indians from selling allotments for 25 years. An amendment to this law, the so-called Dead Indian Act, allows the commissioner of Indian affairs to waive this restriction for Indians who have inherited land from original allottees. The act is passed in response to pressure from whites who want to buy Indian lands and from Indians, particularly those of mixed heritage, who want to be able to sell their own property.
World History
