Fallon County - Boarding Schools in Montana

Background Info/ Historical Story:

“Towards the end of the 19th century, Native American tribes had been mostly confined to reservations. Their nomadic lifestyle had been curtailed, and they found themselves living a difficult existence. Food was scarce, and poverty was rampant. To further erode the Native lifestyle, the government, in conjunction with religious organizations, developed the concept of Indian boarding schools. The first of these opened in Carlisle, PA in 1879. The concept was the brainchild of Brigadier General Richard Pratt. The essence of the Indian boarding school was cultural assimilation, boiled down in a phrase Pratt coined: "Kill the Indian, Save the Man." To accomplish this, children were taken from their parents and often moved hundreds of miles from their home to live and attend school at a boarding school. Government funding enabled religious schools to function. Every essence of Native culture was stripped from these small children, and they lived difficult lives full of school, prayer, work, punishment, and hunger.

Cultural assimilation is when a minority group or culture comes to resemble the dominant group or culture. European Americans wanted to force Native Americans to assimilate. They attempted this through many ways including imposing new religious views, imposing views of land ownership, and pushing Natives to become farmers and ranchers. These were all drastic changes. Natives had their own religious beliefs, they had very different views of the uses of land, and most Montana tribes did not farm or raise cattle or sheep. European Americans believed the Native way of doing things was inferior and the only course of reasonable action was for the Native Americans to change. Native Americans educated their children in ways that were also considered inferior and Euro-Americans forced Native children into new schools.”- Native American Boarding Schools in Montana, Montana History Portal

The Fort Peck Agency Boarding School, also known as the Poplar Boarding School, was established in 1881 and was meant to assimilate children from the Assinoboine and Sioux Tribes (whose territory reached into Fallon County).

Item From Collections:

• Fallon County Times- Thu, Dec 20, 1923 - Poplar Boarding School

Photos, Maps, etc:

• Sioux Indian Girls at Boarding School, Poplar Between 1905-1913
• MT County and Tribal Map

Links to other helpful sources:

• Poplar Boarding School Article
• Fort Peck Assiniboine & Sioux Tribal History
• Mandan, Hidatsa, Sahnish | North Dakota Studies
• Native American Boarding Schools in Montana