A people with no place: Story of Little Shell Tribe told in Montana historian’s new book

September 22, 2013 12:00 am  •  By Marga Lincoln of the Independent Record

Photos by Eliza Wiley of the Independent Record

Nicholas Vrooman, above, has completed the first comprehensive history book of the Little Shell Tribe, titled “The Whole Country was ... ‘One Robe’ The Little Shell Tribe’s America.”

Ever since walking out on fraudulent treaty negotiations by the U.S. government in 1892, the Little Shell Tribe of Montana has been a landless tribe.

For more than 130 years they have sought federal tribal recognition.

New hope stirs today that this may become a reality.

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And helping in this quest is a new book by Helena historian Nicholas Vrooman, “The Whole Country was … One Robe: The Little Shell Tribe’s America.”

For the first time, it brings together their history and story into one beautifully illustrated and

meticulously researched book. It was printed this spring by the Little Shell tribe of Chippewa Indians of Montana and Drumlummon Institute.

No other person is in a better position to weave together their complex story than Vrooman, who was Montana’s State Folklorist from 1990 to 1994. It was also based on his University of Montana Ph.D. dissertation.

Much of the book began with stories Vrooman has carried in his head and heart for decades.

“I have a love for the spoken word and narrative, dance and culture,” said Vrooman in an interview this week in his historic Helena home that abounds with artwork, graphics, historic articles and crafts of the Little Shell.

Now, the stories he collected are supported by historic documents from government files, photos and paintings.

A story 40 years in the making

Vrooman’s fascination with the Little Shell began more than 40 years ago when at the age of 27 he came to work on the (Spieker/Mannix Ranch) in Helmville. There he became friends with the ranch ramrod Bill “Snowball” Doney, who told stories of his Little Shell ancestors.

Another crucial piece of Little Shell history fell into place in the 1980s when Vrooman worked on The Turtle Mountain Chippewa Reservation in North Dakota and learned their oral histories.

The stories of the two groups were interconnected, evidence of a common history stretching over a vast homeland of more than 1,000 miles from the Red River to the Rocky Mountain Front.

The book’s title comes from a historical quote by Eli Guardipee describing when he was a child in 1868, the buffalo were so abundant in Montana, it was as if he were seeing the whole country under one robe.

But the quote is also a larger metaphor, said Vrooman, for a more inclusive world view.

Complex history

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The book also challenges how the federal government arbitrarily labels and officially recognizes tribes, Vrooman said.

“Critical pieces of identity, power and sovereignty were lost in translation,” Vrooman writes of governmental actions or “blunders” impacting the Little Shell to this day.

Theirs is a rich and complex story of a people who lived in an area that would become the border between Canada and the United States when the official national boundaries were drawn, resulting in displacement of many of their traditional settlements.

“The Little Shell are historically part of a larger cultural group, the Nehiyaw Pwat Confederacy,” Vrooman said, which was known as the Iron Alliance.

They were among the first aboriginal people in the West to interact with Western European culture as it pushed west and quickly adopted the new tools and clothing. Many of the traders and trappers would marry into the tribe and live with them.

This aboriginal people became a culturally rich “poly-ethnic” group of Chippewa, Cree, Assiniboine, French and Scottish heritage, Vrooman said. Frequently, they have been called the Metis or Michif. “The Nehiyaw Pwat were a modern Indian society.”

Just as the Blackfeet Confederacy is recognized as being made up of five groups — Piegan, Kainaa (or Bloods), the Siksikawa, Tsuu T’ina (or Sarcee) and the Gros Ventre — the Nehiyaw Pwat is an amalgam, of which the Little Shell are a part. Rather than recognizing this, the government labeled them Chippewa.

Many whites called them “halfbreeds.”

‘Thoroughly aboriginal’

Lost in translation is the fact that they remained aboriginal peoples, said Vrooman. “They were thoroughly aboriginal” and their roots can be traced back to the 1730s.

“That’s a new finding,” Vrooman said.

“The scope of the book is huge,” he said, of the massive amount of research it contains in its 470 pages.

“Keeping it all wrangled was the task. It took 30 long years of gestation. It affirms 125 years of Little Shell history. … They contributed significantly to what made Montana today. It affirms who the Little Shell are. It gives them a place in the circle of tribes in Montana. It legitimizes their place.”

Among the documenting photos is one of a winter count, created in 1905 of an 1820 buffalo hunt, depicting the new mélange society hunting on Montana’s Milk River drainage. The hunters carry flintlocks, and use wheeled “Red River” carts.

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It’s visual proof that these ancestors of the Little Shell lived as an aboriginal people that adapted tools of European society, said Vrooman.

An 1849 painting by Paul Kane “Half Breed Encampment” depicts tribal teepees, along with the wheeled “Red River” carts and oxen they used.

Another Kane painting shows ancestors of the Little Shell traveling by horse, along with carts and wagons drawn by oxen and horse.

‘Civil rights story’

On the nation’s 50th anniversary of major civil rights marches for blacks, the civil rights of the

Little Shell have been quietly lost in obscure stacks of bureaucratic paperwork, said Vrooman.

“This is the civil rights story of our time,” said Vrooman. “The South has Jim Crow laws, we’ve got the Little Shell. It’s a significant story.”

Without federal recognition or federal funding, “the tribe scrapes by on donations, bake sales and raffles,” said Vrooman.

“All other tribes have a place,” he said, “but (the Little Shell) have been dispersed in Moccasin Flats, Buckskin Flats and Breedtowns.” After the loss of the buffalo herds, they were relegated to scavenging food from the dumps on the edges of Butte, Helena and Billings.

The state of Montana recognized the Little Shell as a tribe in 2003, when the Montana Supreme Court determined the tribe met all the criteria for federal recognition.

The state and Montana’s congressional delegation have consistently supported federal recognition of the tribe, said Vrooman.

Approximately 560 tribes are recognized by the U.S. government, said Vrooman. Another 260, including the Little Shell, are petitioning for recognition.

The Little Shell’s latest fpederal petition took 22 years, from 1978 to 2000, when they received a positive preliminary finding, he said.

In 2005, additional materials in support of their preliminary finding were given to the Bureau of Indian Affairs, only to be denied recognition in an Oct. 27, 2009, “final determination.”

“No positive preliminary finding was ever overturned before,” said Vrooman.

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A new hope

Vrooman worked with the Native American Rights Fund on a 90-day appeal, refuting what he calls “the poor analysis by the BIA.”

For two years nothing happened, then in February of this year the tribe was informed their appeal had risen to the top of the pile. In July it was sent directly to the Secretary of the Interior because of some of the issues it raised.

This week, the BIA announced plans to overhaul federal regulations for tribal recognition.

Vrooman’s convinced the BIA’s revisions are, in large part, a result of the issues raised in the Little Shell’s case.

He expects the Little Shell will re-apply for federal recognition under the new BIA requirements.

The book will be used to not only support this, but also by Montana’s Office of Public Instruction to develop teaching materials on Little Shell tribal history.

The book is funded by the Montana Legislature and administered by Montana’s OPI.

It is available for purchase for $39.95 at Montana Book & Toy Company or on Amazon, and is distributed through River Bend Press.

Copyright 2014 Montana Standard.

Compiled and Edited by Lawrence BarkwellCoordinator of Metis Heritage and History ResearchLouis Riel Institute

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