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 With
an innovative multi-media educational program, grounded in a
series of video do cumentaries, the Diversity Foundation
and Diversity Productions, will recall the early Native American experiences of people in the Upper Midwest, drawing upon the stories and memories of living elders.
When white settlers first came to this region, the principal group indigenous to what is now southern Minnesota were the Dakotah people, who became commonly known as the Great Sioux Nation. The Ojibwe people, known in treaties with the USA as Chippewa but, in their own language, as Anishinabe, predominantly occupied the northern woodlands. Both tribes had been driven westward by forceful expansion of the US frontier.
The educational series will begin with documentaries built upon interviews with elders in these tribal communities, dispersed throughout the Upper Midwest. Perspectives reflected in oral accounts of elders will be complemented by historical photos and dramatizations. The series will encompass an analysis rare in popular education. The initial episode sets the tone for the series.
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Mitakuye Oyasin
(We are all related)
"Without understanding Native Americans, we will never know who we are today as Americans." -- Jack Weatherford |
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 "You need to listen to all our Dakota elders and tell our side of the story before it is too late and this culture and history is lost forever."
Eli Taylor, Dakota elder and historian, Sioux Valley Dakota Reserve, Manitoba, Canada
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Episode One: Wapasha's Prairie
 October, 2002, during filming for the Wapasha Prairie Documentary, Hereditary Chief Ernest Wabasha VII overlooks St. Paul's skyline and Wabasha Bridge. The bridge was named and rededicated after his legendary great-grandfather in 1998.
In the summer of 1998, when the new Wabasha Street Bridge was dedicated in downtown St. Paul, Ernest Wabasha VII was asked to be part of the ceremony and say prayers on the bridge.
The poignancy of the moment was accentuated by the memory that, 135 years earlier, after the 1862 Dakota Conflict, the last of Minnesota's Dakota people had been herded onto boats at the same site, dodging gunfire from St. Paul residents as they began the final leg of their journey into forced exile.
Wabasha VII is the hereditary chief of the Mdewakanton
Band of Dakota. In the mid-19th
century, in the areas known as the
city of Winona, Minnesota, Wapasha
I, his family and the members of his
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Ernest Wabasha VII |
band made their home. Wapasha I, regarded by some as the premier Chief of the Great Dakota Nation, was Highly respected by the French and British colonial governments, Chief Wapasha negotiated peace and trade agreements for his people prior to the advance of white settlers from the East. He received medals of honor and was given full military uniform and rank from the British. Some say that the song, "Hail to the Chief," was originally composed in his honor following a great act of bravery. (White settlers later changed the Wapasha name in texts to Wabasha.)
AAs Ernest Wabasha stood on that bridge, his prayer was not for the steel and concrete in the bridge but for the people of the area. He prayed that we learn to respect and honor one another. He prayed that the different races might come together and remember this prayer for peace as they use the bridge. "Not too long ago," he recalled, "We were being killed for practicing our religion. Now they want us to come and pray..."
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Ernest Wabasha, in 1986, stood by the bust of his great-great-grandfather, Chief Wabasha III in front of the Minnesota State Capitol. It is the only bust of a Native American at the Capitol. |
lll though the Wabasha Street Bridge, Wabasha Street in St. Paul, the city and county of Wabasha, Minnesota, and the bust of Wabasha III, housed in the State Capitol, reflect major commemorations to this family, many Minnesotans are unaware of the significance of these honors and of the history associated with the Wabasha name.
FOR MORE INFORMATION VISIT:
St.Paul Pioneer Press article, July 15, 1998 --
Indian Chief's descendents due honor as Wabasha Bridge opens
St.Paul Pioneer Press article, July 16, 1998 --
Bridge opens for next century, with blessing from a namesake
St.Paul Pioneer Press article, July 16, 1998 --
A way of making connections/hundreds attend blessing, opening of Wabasha Bridge.
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Wabasha family at Winona State University Pow Wow in 1999, the first Wabasha family visit back to Winona (formerly called Wapasha Prairie) since Chief Wapasha III and his band were forced to leave here in the 1850s.
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Diversity Foundation has already videotaped numerous hours of interviews with the Wabasha family and other Dakota elders and their descendants and has begun the extensive research of early Winona history necessary for this story. The foundation will utilize this material and supplemental footage to help, through a Video Documentary, tell the story of this family and its contributions during this pivotal period in the formation of Minnesota.
To enhance the documentary, the foundation plans to include interactive CDs and teacher manuals so they may be included in area school and state wide curriculums. Also discussions are already underway with the state historical society and local museums.
To date the project has been endorsed and supported by the Sisseton-Wahpeton Sioux Tribal Council, Spirit Lake Dakota Nation, City of Winona and its mayor's and city
manager's offices, Winona Area Schools, Winona County Historical Society, Minnesota Advocates for Human Rights, Senators Paul Wellstone and Mark Dayton, Minnesota League of Human Rights and several local businesses. The project also continues to gain support from numerous Dakota elders in the Upper Midwest and Canada. Foundation officials feel this documentary could serve as a prototype/model for other early Native American History projects in communities across Minnesota, the Dakotas, and all across the Great Plains. It is our belief that this project will help to educate, honor and pay tribute to the history and culture of our "First People."
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