I have been away for awhile, but I wanted to remind everyone of a cause that is dear to me. A cause that we can all participate in: CHANGE is ready to happen and as American's we can give the children of Pine Ridge Reservation a chance to excel and create a better world for themselves and all of us. Their contributions will be of global importance and given the history of these people, as with all aboriginals around the world, they will aid in the restoration of the Earth's Balance.
Read this please, and be sure to make use of the links.
Best to you all in the New Year!
Diane Davis White
The Pine
Ridge Indian Reservation (Wazí Aháŋhaŋ
Oyáŋke in Lakota, also called Pine
Ridge Agency) is an Oglala Lakota Native American reservation located
in the U.S. state of South Dakota.
Originally included within the territory of the Great Sioux Reservation, Pine Ridge was established
in 1889 in the southwest corner of South Dakota on the Nebraska border. Today
it consists of 3,468.86 sq mi (8,984.306 km2) of land area and
is the eighth-largest reservation in the United States, larger than Delaware and Rhode Island combined.
The reservation encompasses the
entirety of Shannon County, the southern half of Jackson County and the northwest
portion of Bennett County. Of the 3,143 counties in the United
States, these are among the poorest. Only 84,000 acres (340 km2)
of land are suitable for agriculture. Extensive off-reservation trust lands are
held mostly scattered throughout Bennett County (all of Bennett County was part
of Pine Ridge until May 1910),[1][2] and
also extend into adjacent Pine
Ridge (Whiteclay), Nebraska in Sheridan County, just south of the community of Pine Ridge, South Dakota, the administrative center
and largest community within the reservation. The 2000 census population of the
reservation was 15,521; but a study conducted by Colorado State University and
accepted by the United States Department of
Housing and Urban Development has estimated the
resident population to reach 28,787.[3]
Pine Ridge is the site of several
events that marked tragic milestones in the history between the Sioux of the area and
the United States (U.S.)
government and its citizens. Stronghold Table—a mesa in what is today
the Oglala-administered portion of Badlands National Park—was the location of the last
of the Ghost Dances. The
U.S. authorities' attempt to repress this movement eventually led to the Wounded Knee Massacre on
December 29, 1890. A mixed band of Miniconjou Lakota
and Hunkpapa Sioux,
led by Chief Spotted Elk,
sought sanctuary at Pine Ridge after fleeing the Standing Rock Agency, where Sitting Bull had
been killed during efforts to arrest him. The families were intercepted by a
heavily armed detachment of the Seventh Cavalry, which attacked them, killing
many women and children as well as warriors. This was the last large engagement
between U.S. forces and Native Americans and
marked the end of the western frontier.
Changes accumulated in the last
quarter of the 20th century; in 1971 the Oglala Sioux Tribe (OST) started Oglala Lakota College, a tribal college, which offers 4-year degrees. In
1973 decades of discontent at the Pine Ridge Reservation resulted in a
grassroots protest that escalated into the Wounded Knee Incident, gaining national attention.
Members of the Oglala Lakota, the American Indian Movement, and supporters occupied the
town in defiance of federal and state law enforcement in a protest that turned
into an armed standoff lasting 71 days. This event inspired American Indians
across the country and gradually led to changes at the reservation, with a
revival of some cultural traditions. In 1981 the Lakota Tim Giago started
the Lakota Times at
Pine Ridge, the first independent Native American newspaper in the nation,
which he published until selling it in 1998.
At the southern end of the Badlands, the
reservation is part of the mixed
grass prairie, an ecological transition zone between the short-grass
and tall-grass prairies; all are part of the Great Plains. A
great variety of plant and animal life flourishes on and adjacent to the
reservation, including the endangered black-footed
ferret. The area is also important in the field of paleontology; it
contains deposits of Pierre Shale formed
on the seafloor of the Western Interior Seaway, evidence of the marine Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary, and one of the
largest deposits of fossils of extinct mammals from the Oligocene epoch.
