photo #9177171

Photograph Title ~ “SEVERELY MALNOURISHED DAKOTA INDIAN WOMAN IN A TIPI", 1891, at concentration camp, Fort Snelling. Following the systemic slaughter of the Buffalo nations...~ “They take our land, they take our hunting and then they force us to work for food that make us sick." - On the Great Plains, tribes came to be seen grudgingly as "Wards of the Nation" and were guaranteed at least on paper, food rations by treaties signed with the United States government in exchange for their vast traditional lands.Following the government sanctioned near extermination of the Buffalo to force tribes onto reservations and rid itself of the, “Indian problem, rations cards were issued by the indian agent to the heads of each household for up to nine dependents once weekly. Food rations were often late, the rotting meats caused rampant sickness and death especially for the children and elders. Rations came in the form of beef, flour and pork with the occasional coffee, sugar, soap and tobacco. Indian agents came to use rations as a form of coercement, to threaten against participation in cultural gatherings, forcing Native families to send their children to government boarding schools often hundreds of miles away, often with the warning threat to take away a family’s ration ticket if they refused to comply.Over time, the promise of rations came to be seen as a burden by society of the day, a view often promoted by politicians and in statements made the national media. Rations were decreased and ultimately eliminated. Over time the land and climate could not sustain and support the small-scale agriculture the government indian agents were forcing Natives into under the admonition issued, prevalent at the time, "Till or starve!".Brutal winters during the Reservation confinement era killed the native people’s cattle further environmental stressors were introduced through government issued passes allowing for settlers to graze cattle herds upon supposedly protected reservation