1889

Susan La Flesche becomes the first female Native American physician.

Graduating first in her class, Omaha Indian Susan La Flesche is awarded a medical degree from the Women’s College of Medicine in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, thereby becoming the first Indian female to be fully trained in Western medicine. Her education has been funded by the Connecticut Indian Association, a group of pro-assimilation non-Indian reformers.

After graduation, La Flesche will return to the Omaha Reservation in Nebraska. There the Bureau of Indian Affairs will hire her as the reservation’s physician, making her the only doctor available to the more than 1,000 reservation residents.

The Sioux Bill breaks up the Great Sioux Reservation.

Congress passes the Sioux Bill, which divides the Great Sioux Reservation established by the Treaty of Fort Laramie (see entry for NOVEMBER 7, 1868) into six smaller reservations: Standing Rock, Pine Ridge, Rosebud, Cheyenne River, Crow Creek, and

Lower Brule. The law also opens nine million acres of former reservation land to settlement by whites and allows for remaining Sioux lands to be divided into 320-acre allotments to be owned by individual Indians.

January 1

Northern Paiute (Numu) prophet Wovoka founds a new Indian religion.

While cutting wood in tribal lands in western Nevada, a Northern Paiute (Numu) named Wovoka has a fever-induced vision. By his account, he dies and goes to heaven, where he encounters his dead ancestors. While in heaven, he is also given instruction from God on how Indians should live. They should avoid fighting, live in peace with whites, and perform the traditional Paiute Round Dance. Wovoka himself is given by God the power to control natural elements as well as the position of co-vice president of the United States. Wovoka’s revelation will lead him to found the Ghost Dance movement, which will soon be embraced by the Indians throughout the Great Plains (see entry for SUMMER 1890).

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“When the sun died, I went up to heaven and saw God and all the people who had died a long time ago. God told me to come back and tell my people they must be good and love one another, and not fight, or steal, or lie. He gave me this dance to give to my people.” —Northern Paiute (Numu) prophet Wovoka, on his religious revelation

April 22

The Unassigned Lands in Indian Territory are opened to non-Indians.

A 2-million-acre region in the center of Indian Territory that has not been assigned to an Indian group is opened to settlement by non-Indians. In the first of a series of rushes on former Indian Territory land, more than 50,000 non-Indians claim plots of land on this single day.