Rocky Boy's Indian Reservation
Rocky Boy's Indian Reservation is one of seven Native American reservations in the U.S. state of Montana. Established by an act of Congress on September 7, 1916, it was named after Ahsiniiwin, the chief of the Chippewa band, who had died a few months earlier. It was established for landless Chippewa Indians in the American West, but within a short period of time many Cree and Métis were also settled there. Today the Cree outnumber the Chippewa on the reservation. The Bureau of Indian Affairs recognizes it as the Chippewa Cree Reservation.
The reservation is located in Hill and Chouteau counties in north central Montana, about from the Canada–U.S. border. It has a total land area of, which includes extensive off-reservation trust lands. The reservation reportedly has 3,323 enrolled members, 55% of the total 6,177 enrolled members in the tribe.
Description
The reservation was established by congressional statute on September 7, 1916, to provide land for the Rocky Boy's Band of Chippewa Indians, who had been forced out of territory in Minnesota and were landless. The Rocky Boy's Indian Reservation is in the Bears Paw Mountains in north-central Montana. According to the map of Montana, the reservation takes in land within the boundaries of Hill and Chouteau counties, about south of the Canada–United States border. It is the smallest reservation in the state in terms of land area, with a total land area of, which includes extensive off-reservation trust lands. The population was 3,323 at the 2010 census, an increase of 24 percent compared to 2000. Three other reservations of the seven in the state also had population growth during this period.The Bureau of Indian Affairs' Labor Force Report of 2005 reported 5,656 enrolled members in the tribe. The largest community of the reservation is Box Elder, although a small part of Box Elder extends off reservation lands. More than 80% of the tribal enrolled members are classifiable as "adoptees" under the tribal constitution, as they have non-Chippewa tribal origin.
Rocky Boy's unusual name was derived from the English mistranslation of the name of the tribal chief, Ahsiniiwin. His name was closer in meaning to "Stone Child". The Chippewa who are descendants of Chief Rocky Boy say his name is Asiniweyin, meaning "Stone Being", or "Being of Stone".
The Department of Interior refers to the Chippewa-Cree Tribe as being the recognized tribe on the reservation, but this is a term of convenience. The Chippewa and Cree peoples are distinct tribes among the several that are part of the larger Anishinaabe family.
History
Chief Rocky Boy wrote to the Bureau of Indian Affairs and later to President Theodore Roosevelt on January 14, 1902, asking the U.S. government for land, housing, and education for his band of Chippewa Indians, composed of 130 men, women and children. They had been forced out of areas to the east and were landless. Also among landless Indians in Montana were a band of Cree.Chief Rocky Boy worked with Republican Senator Joseph M. Dixon, writer Frank Bird Linderman, and other influential individuals in Montana, including painter Charles Russell, to achieve his goal. He lived mainly in north central Montana, although he also traveled to southwestern and western areas of the state. The Rocky Boy Band was listed at 75 in a 1908 census that was certified by the Department of the Interior. Another 39 were listed separately as affiliated persons but not Chippewa, by agent Thralls B. Wheat, who was responsible for land allotments.
In 1908, Montana passed the Land Acts, regulating Native American lands. The Swan Valley Massacre of 1908 in the northwest part of the state aroused outrage among Native Americans. A small Pend d'Oreilles hunting party, which included women and elders, was attacked by state officials while they were hunting off-reservation in their traditional territory. This right was protected by treaties with the US government, but the state thought they had the power to regulate it. An armed game warden confronted the party when he thought they had not moved out of their camp quickly enough and shot at members. Gunfire was exchanged, and a total of four Pend d'Oreille were killed in the incident, as was the game warden.
In November 1909, over 100 landless Chippewa-Cree from southwestern and western Montana and northern Idaho gathered near Helena to be relocated to a new homeland on the Blackfeet Reservation, which was closer to their traditional home. With the new Chippewa-Cree Reservation approved and set aside, the government redirected the Chippewa-Cree to the Chippewa band's new home. The new reservation was located between St. Mary, Babb, and the Canada–US border. It was first called the Babb Reservation.
Chief Little Bear soon followed Rocky Boy with his own band, arriving with about 200 Cree from Canada after the North-West Rebellion. According to knowledgeable Blackfeet, the name plates are still discernible, showing the effort to relocate the Chippewa there.
Anishinaabe leaders feared they would lose the land and forced the Chippewa away, as they were not Blackfeet people and were not entitled to allotments. The US Army had allowed the Chippewa and other landless Indians, including Cree refugees, to settle at Fort Assinniboine in Hill County. By 1912–1913 nearly 600 Chippewa and Cree were living on the large Fort Assinniboine Military Reservation. The Rocky Boy Reservation, which was formed in part by land ceded by the Army from Fort Assinniboine. Most of those settled in the area were Cree refugees from Canada in the U.S. under terms of asylum.
Rocky Boy had already supervised his Chippewa band census in 1908 and had it certified by the Interior Department. Chief Rocky Boy was living on the new Chippewa Reservation near Babb, Montana with 50 to 60 people. He negotiated with the US Indian agent for additional lands, which were approved in 1916. Soon after the reservation was officially established, Chippewa and other landless Indians, to include the Cree from north central Montana, western Montana, and northern Idaho, settled alongside those already living on the new Rocky Boy Reservation.
With Frank Linderman leading many of the European-American supporters, the US Congress passed legislation in 1916 to establish what was first called Rocky Boy's Reservation. The Indian Inspector Frank Churchill was sent to Montana to negotiate with the chief. Ahsiniiwin educated Churchill about the Chippewa, saying that they lived all around Montana, including at the Blackfeet and Flathead reservations, as well as near many cities dominated by European Americans, including Anaconda, Billings, Butte, Deer Lodge, Great Falls, Havre, Helena, Missoula, Wolf Point and others. Ahsiniiwin asserted that he was peaceful at all times, and he spoke only for the Chippewa people. He had worked to establish Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation and signed the 1889 Red Lake Agreement in Minnesota.
Churchill asked the Department of Interior to withdraw all of Valley County from white settlement in order to establish a new closed Chippewa reservation there. Both requests were granted by the Department of Interior. In the end, many of the Chippewa-Cree who lived in western Montana were not willing to relocate to far northeastern Montana. Chippewa notation: The Sharrock report/addendum to the official Ewers Report notes the 1908 land was proposed for "Rocky Boy's Band of Chippewa Indians".
Chippewa notation : According to the papers of Indian agent Frank Bird Linderman, Chief Rocky Boy died at Ft. Assiniboine on April 18, 1916. Contemporary newspapers also reported that Rocky Boy died in Fort Assiniboine.
But Robert Gopher, an oral historian of the Chippewa, says that Rocky Boy was assassinated by rival Cree who used poison roots. They were anxious to settle at the reservation. According to the oral traditions of the Saskatchewan Cree, Little Bear was known to use a specific poisonous root to kill political rivals. If the assassination account is true, it threatened the Cree settlement at Rocky Boy Reservation. Linderman supposedly said that rocky Boy in his last words said he did not want to accept the Cree on the newly established reservation. But they had already been occupying land in the area and at Fort Assiniboine.
In 1917 a census was conducted at Rocky Boy Reservation in order to establish a tribal roll for what became known as the Chippewa Cree Tribe. Chippewa notation: James McLaughlin, the Interior Agent who entered errors on the 1917 tribal roll, is the same agent who sold Rocky Boy's land in Thief River, Minnesota. The proceeds of that sale were distributed to the Chippewa people of Red Lake, who were established on a reservation of that name.
Chippewa Cree Tribal Buffalo Pasture
For cultural and food sovereignty purposes, a buffalo herd was established in 2021 on. Bison is the correct taxonomic term for American bison, but buffalo is the common vernacular term. Surrounded by of fencing, the Pasture is about a mile from Box Elder, Montana. The Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes donated five bison and American Prairie donated six. In 2022, they received ten bison from American Prairie to strengthen the herd.Economic development
According to the Tribal Chairman's address to the Havre Area Chamber of Commerce in January 2007, the annual tribal revenue of $52 million is infused into the local economy as a result of federal programs, private business, and tribal businesses on the Rocky Boy's Reservation. The majority of reservation residents work for the self-governing Chippewa Cree Tribe. Compacts are maintained with the Bureau of Indian Affairs and Indian Health Service. Funds originating within the BIA , together with tribal government, provide work for 231 full- and part-time employees.The tribe has set up the Chippewa Cree Community Development Corporation, which employs 25 people. Other enterprises include Chippewa Cree Construction Company, Chippewa Cree Construction Corporation, National Tribal Development Association, Northern Winz Casino, and RJS & Associates,
The tribe operates and administers its own educational system: the Rocky Boy public schools with 184 teachers and staff. Like other tribes, it has set up a tribal college, known as Stone Child Community College, which employs 57.
It also has services for enrolled members, and operates the Chippewa Cree Housing Authority. By the Tribe's compact with the Indian Health Service, it employs 135 staff within the Rocky Boy Health Board.
In 2011, the tribe began a new business with Plain Green Loans, an online lending company. It had a staff of 25 as of December 2011. Plain Green and similar companies owned by other tribes have been criticized for profiting from high-interest online loans. The Chippewa Cree are part of the Native American Lending Alliance, an organization of tribes that are in the business of online lending.