OPA

CLOVERDALE RANCHERIA TERMINATED

Twenty descendants of Porno Indians who live on the Cloverdale Rancheria in Sonoma County, California, began a new chapter in their lives recently when the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs terminated trusteeship over their lands. The termination, approved by the Indians and involving 27.5 acres of small land parcels, was the 22nd such action taken by the Bureau under the California Rancheria Act of 1958. The act provides for distribution of rancheria assets to the Indian owners and an end to Federal services. The Cloverdale Indians now have the same status as other California citizens who are taxpaying property-owners.

SENECAS PLAN NEW INDUSTRY

A recent agreement between the Seneca Nation of Indians and a newly-formed organization known as the First Seneca Corporation calls for the establishment of a factory on the Cattaraugus Reservation in New York State. The plant will manufacture decorative pillows and similar items.

The Corporation is financed principally by the Seneca Nation, which has agreed to furnish working capital and funds for construction of a 60,000 square foot factory building, machinery and equipment. The Senecas will invest approximately $800,000 in the venture. Lease terms provide for amortization of the investment over the period of the long-term lease. Tribal officials expects the new industry to provide jobs for 300 tribal members and to effectively clear up reservation unemployment.

APACHES VIEW TREE LIGHTING CEREMONY

When President Johnson threw the switch that lighted the 1965 National Community Christmas Tree in Washington, D. C. on December 17, five Apaches were with him. The White Mountain Apache Tribe were the donors of the Nation's Christmas Tree, the largest ever to grace the grassy ellipse behind the White House. The tribal delegation to the tree-lighting ceremony were Lester Oliver, Tribal chairman; Fred Banashley, vice chairman; Mary Endfield, tribal secretary; Mary V. Riley and Nelson Lupe, Sr., council members.

SPORTING GOODS FIRM TO LOCATE AT SISSETON

A leading manufacturer of sporting equipment, Herter's Inc., of Waseca, Minnesota, has announced plans to establish a new manufacturing facility at Sisseton, South Dakota, the principal community on the Sisseton Indian Reservation. The new company, to be known as Swiss Precision Industrial Armament Corporation, will produce 12-gauge shotgun shells and employ about 40 men in a two-shift operation. Many of the employees will be Sioux Indians from the Reservation. Production is expected to begin by March 1966.

Assisting in the establishment of the plant are the Sisseton Development Corporation, the South Dakota economic development agency, and the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs. The Sisseton Development Corporation will cooperate with the manufacturer in constructing three steel buildings on a 30-acre industrial site about one-half mile east of the community. Cost of the buildings is estimated at $150,000.

UINTAH AND OURAY DEDICATE NEW HOMES

The first three homes completed under a mutual-help housing program on the Uintah and Ouray Reservation in Utah were dedicated in formal ceremonies recently. The homes are part of a ten-house project which the Uintah and Ouray Tribal Housing Authority expects will be completed shortly. The Authority is planning to undertake construction of an additional 15 mutual-help houses in the spring.

Mutual help housing is a cooperative program developed by the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Public Housing Administration. Indian families contribute their labor on home construction in lieu of cash down payments. The Public Housing Administration advances funds for materials and necessary skilled labor.

PILOT TRAINING PROJECT FOR NAVAJOS

The Bureau of Indian Affairs and BVD Company of New York City are launching a pilot training program for 30 Navajos at Winslow, Arizona which could result in the eventual employment of approximately 1,000 Navajo Indians.

If the project is successful, BVD is slated to build a new plant on the Navajo Reservation in or near Tuba City, Arizona. Long-range plans call for establishment of two additional plants elsewhere on the reservation, depending upon the success of the pilot project.

INTERLOCUTORY ORDER ENTERED IN CREEK CLAIMS CASE

The Indian Claims Commission has issued an Interlocutory Order granting the sum of $1,037,414, less offsets, to the Creek Nation of Oklahoma (Docket No. 276). The Commission found that 2,037,414 acres of Creek land in Oklahoma was worth $1 an acre when ceded to the United States on August 7, 1856, and that $1 million has been paid for it. The Creek Nation must await the Commission's further action to determine offset deductions and the granting of a final award before funds will be appropriated by Congress.

ROAD PROJECTS ON COLORADO RIVER INDIAN RESERVATION

The Department of the Interior recently announced the award of a $393,633 contract to the Fisher Contracting Company of Phoenix for reshaping, surfacing and plant mix paving of more than twenty miles of road on the Colorado River Indian Reservation in Arizona. Eight other bids ranging from $406,776.85 to $610,726.50 were received.

COCHITI PUEBLO AGREES TO DAM PROJECT

The Cochiti Indian pueblo of New Mexico has approved a 50 million dollar project which will flood 4,000 acres of pueblo land through construction of a 5.3-mile earth-filled dam on the Rio Grande River.

The Indians have signed an easement with the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers and received $145,200 for granting the authority to flood the land.

Construction of Cochiti Dam, to be the second largest of its kind west of the Mississippi, is expected to provide a monthly payroll of about $500,000 and jobs for nearly 1,000 people in the area.

Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall today petitioned the Federal Power Commission for leave to intervene in the pending application by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Reservation, Montana, to compel the Montana Power Company to maintain proper amortization reserves at its Kerr Project on the Flathead River in Montana.

Secretary Udall said the Tribes have charged the Company is failing to maintain amortization reserves in the manner required by the Federal Power Act and the license.

The tribes assert they are being prejudiced by this failure since the Company's records do not fully reflect the Tribes' beneficial interest in the project, Secretary Udall said.

He said that as Secretary of the Interior he holds in trust the Tribal lands occupied by the Kerr project and therefore has an interest in assuring the Tribes receive full benefit from their lands.

The petition pointed out that the Secretary of the Interior also has specific statutory duties with respect to possible recapture by the United States of licensed projects, as provided in the Federal Power Act.

Project revenues accounted for as amortization reserves will reduce the licensee's net investment and the amount the United States will have to pay the licensee upon recapture of the project, he said. This will substantially affect the decision the United States must make with respect to each licensed project-- whether recapture is in the national interest, Secretary Udall said.

The conclusion reached by the Commission on the Flathead Indian complaint may serve as a precedent in other proceedings in which the United States will be seeking to assert its right of recapture, the petition said.

"Oklahoma! Its very name stirs memories of a long-ago Indian civilization.”

So begins “Indians of Oklahoma" - a 16-page illustrated booklet published this week as the first of a regional series to be issued by the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs. About a dozen more booklets will follow, each devoted to the history and progress of Indians in a particular state or region.

“At least 68 tribes are associated with Oklahoma's history,” Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall pointed out. "The State's name, in fact, means 'red people'. We feel that the Oklahoma booklet is the perfect choice as flagship for this new series."

Future booklets will describe the aboriginal peoples of Arizona, North Carolina, New Mexico, Alaska, the Dakotas, Florida and the Gulf Coast, Eastern States, Great Lakes Region, Northwest, Montana and Wyoming, and California, among others.

In addition to informing, the Oklahoma booklet might give the general reader a few surprises. For example:

--No Indian reservations exist in Oklahoma. Most lands passed from tribal to individual Indian ownership before the turn of the century. Today, private lands are "checker boarded" among Indian lands held in trust by the United States for individual Indians and tribes.

--No more than six of Oklahoma's 68 tribes are indigenous to the state. Others were "resettled" there from the East because of pressures exerted by white settlement. Others sought sanctuary in the area of their own accord.

--Only five percent of the original 30 million acres allotted to individual Indians remains in Indian hands. While some owners retained and benefited from their allotments, others sold out for a fraction of the land's value.

The booklet briefly traces the history of Indian migration to the State from other parts of the country, and describes their progress and problems of today. Oklahoma is unique in that most of its Indian people live among the general population and are often not recognizable as Indians apart from other citizens.

Included in the booklet is a map identifying the origin of Oklahoma tribes and 11 photographs of life among the Indians, both today and in the past. Copies are available at 15 cents apiece from Superintendent of Documents, U. S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. A discount of 25 percent is allowed on quantity orders of 100 or more, to be mailed to one address.

A total of $65.8 million was awarded to Indian tribes in judgments handed down by the Indian Claims Commission during calendar year 1965, the Bureau of Indian Affairs reported today. Appropriations to meet the judgments were made during the year in 17 of the 24 cases.

Judgment funds from land claims settlements are held in trust for the tribes by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Programs for use of the funds are developed by tribal governing bodies and approved by the Secretary of the Interior.

During the past 5 years, the trend among tribal groups has been to put such money to work by investing in business and industry on the reservations; developing of community recreation and social services; establishing college scholarship funds; and underwriting leadership training programs.

The Indian Claims Commission, an independent tribunal, was created by Congress in 1946 to hear and determine claims of tribes, bands; and other identifiable groups of American Indians living in the United States. More than 850 claims have since been filed, of which about 35 percent have been finally adjudicated. Awards totaling more than $205 million have been granted.

The award of a $2,930,848 contract for the construction of an elementary boarding school at Dilkon, Arizona was announced today by the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs.

The new school complex will make possible the closing of three small trailer schools. Construction plans call for 26 classrooms; a multipurpose building; kitchen-dining building; bus garage; two 128-pupil dormitories; 10 one-bedroom staff apartments; 20 two-bedroom houses and 30 three-bedroom houses and an instructional materials center and administration offices.

Other installations will include a 200,000-gallon ground-water storage tank; pumps and pump houses at two locations with approximately 2.5 miles of 6-inch to 12-inch diameter water mains; sewage collection system with lagoons; bituminous street paving with concrete curbs and gutters, and other ground improvements.

This work, when complete, will expand school facilities at this location to care for 780 additional pupils, beginners through the eighth grade, who are not adequately served by local public schools in their home communities.

The successful bidder was Lembke Construction Co., of Nevada, Inc., Las Vegas, Nevada. Four higher bids, ranging from $3,122,227 to $3,517,830, were received.

NEW OKLAHOMA PLASTICS PIPE PLANT WILL TRAIN INDIANS

Drilling Specialties Company, a subsidiary of Phillips Petroleum Company has announced plans to establish a plastic pipe factory in the Mid-American Industrial District, near Pryor, Oklahoma.

The Company, which expects the new plant to be operating by April, is negotiating an on-the-job training program with the Bureau of Indian Affairs to prepare Indian workers for jobs in the plastic industry. An initial group of 20 Cherokees will be employed, with the figure doubling when full-scale operations are reached.

Pryor, in the heart of Oklahoma Cherokee country, has a notable record of cooperation with the Bureau, and with State and local development agencies, in creating new jobs for Indians.

NEW MEXICO FIRM WILL TRAIN INDIANS

Typical of the many companies that utilize the opportunity to train Indian workers on-the-job under contracts with the Bureau of Indian Affairs is Mt. Taylor Millwork, Inc., of Grants, New Mexico. The company recently negotiated a $6,025 contract to train nine Indians for jobs in the manufacture of lineal molding.

On-the-job training is part of the Bureau’s overall Employment Assistance Program which combats Indian unemployment through training, placement, and the creation of an ever-increasing pool of trained Indian workers.

TIMBER ENTERPRISE THRIVES AT FORT APACHE

The Fort Apache Timber Company, an enterprise of the White Mountain Apache Tribe of Arizona, reports that it is showing a substantial profit. The company began operations in a new sawmill on August 31, 1963. P.N. 74966-66.

The successful operation is traced to a reorganization carried out in May 1964 involving a change in plant management and improvements in milling, woods management, and sales operations, the Bureau of Indian Affairs reported.

WATER EXPLORATION AT BIA SCHOOL SITES

Wells ranging in depths from 100 feet to 1,600 feet are being drilled at seven locations of schools operated by the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Arizona and New Mexico. The drilling, conducted by L. P. Cromer, of Laveen, Arizona, under a $94,400 contract awarded by the Bureau, will seek to supplement the water supply for school plants at Wide Ruins, Beautiful Valley, Gray Hill, Polacca, Cibecue, and Cedar Creek, in Arizona, and at Huerfano, New Mexico. Outcome of the exploration program will determine the feasibility of new or additional facilities at these sites.

CHEROKEE MOTEL PAYS AHEAD ON BIA LOAN

Boundary Tree Motel, at the southern gateway to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in North Carolina, reported that 1965 was the best year in its 20- year history. As a result, the owners--the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians-- have paid ten years ahead, through 1975, the principal installments on a loan extended by the Bureau of Indian Affairs to finance the operation.

The attractive guest lodge, host to thousands of reservation visitors each year, boasts a swimming pool, dining room seating 300, snack bar, and service station. During peak operations in the summer season, the enterprise provides employment for about 70 Cherokees.

RED LAKE MILL TO BE REBUILT

When a fire destroyed their tribal sawmill at Redby, Minnesota, last December 3, the Chippewa Indians of Red Lake Reservation went into action to restore operations. The Red Lake Tribal Council passed a resolution authorizing rebuilding of the mill, which employs 70 tribal members, and plans are now well underway for completion of a new plant by next September.

Construction on the main mill building, a 50 by 150 foot steel structure, will start as soon as spring thaw comes. Work on auxiliary buildings will begin at once under a contract with the Mater Division of the Appleton Machine Company, Appleton, Wisconsin, the company which will also provide engineering services and supply and install new equipment. Total cost of rebuilding the enterprise is estimated at $370,000.

Meanwhile, provision has been made for those whose jobs were Wiped out by the fire. About half of the millworkers were set to work preparing the mill site for rebuilding. Still others are engaged in logging to keep timber coming in for operation of a portable mill that was quickly installed. When a second portable mill is installed soon, all former mill workers will be employed again, utilizing timber on hand and supplying customers.

From prosperity to poverty and back again--three times! That’s the story of North Carolina's Cherokee Indians, as told in a new booklet published this week by the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs.

“Indians of North Carolina," second in a series of regional brochures devoted to the life and times of American Indians, traces Cherokee history in the State from the 18th century to date. According to the booklet, progress of the tribe has been phenomenal in almost every field. For example:

Education---Percentage of Cherokee children attending public schools near the reservation is increasing each year. This practice, encouraged by both tribal leaders and BIA, will become more widespread as North Carolina public school facilities permit.

Industrial development---Using a combination of revolving BIA credit funds and tribal money, the tribe has encouraged the establishment of industry on the reservation to provide more jobs for Cherokees. Tribal investments in plants has totaled more than $230,000.

Tourism---Some five million tourists visit the reservation each year. The Boundary Tree Tribal Motel Enterprise is owned and operated by the Cherokees near the southern entrance to the Great Smoky Mountain National Park, as well as many other tourist facilities.

The 16-page booklet includes photographs and maps. Copies are available at 15 cents apiece from Superintendent of Documents, U. S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. A discount of 25 percent is allowed on quantity orders of 100 or more, to be mailed to one address.

Federal supervision has been terminated for four more rancherias in California in accord with recent legislation, the Department of the Interior announced today. The newly terminated Indian lands are North Fork and Picayune, in Madera County; Graton in Sonoma County; and Pinoleville in Mendocino County.

Under a Congressional Act of August 18, 1958, naming 41 rancherias, and a 1964 amendment to include the remaining 74 California rancherias or reservations, Indians are permitted to distribute lands and other rancheria assets among themselves.

A distribution plan generally calls for surveys and appraisals of the lands and, in some cases, completion of certain land improvements before title is given to individual Indians. The termination action, which thus far has affected a total of 26 rancherias, means that the Indians are no longer eligible for special Federal services because they are Indians but have the same status as other California citizens.

Termination of the four rancherias removes trust restrictions from nearly 275 acres and involves 78 Indians: 1 Mono on the North Fork; 10 Chukchansis on the Picayune; 2 Pomos on the Graton; and 65 Pomos on the Pinoleville Rancheria.

The action becomes effective upon publication in the Federal Register of a notice signed by the Secretary of the Interior.

American Indian art--just now becoming widely recognized in the United States--has already found a solid niche abroad.

From the arts and crafts markets of the Southwest, the Plains, Oklahoma, and Alaska, a collection of these "cultural ambassadors" have been touring the world under the joint auspices of the Interior Department's Indian Arts And Crafts Board, the United States Information Agency, and the State Department.

Paintings in oil and tempera, flamboyant with color and rich with spiritual nuance; sculptures of native North Carolina wood, or soapstone, or ivory from the tusks of walruses; basketry and rugs that fingers have woven while mind and eye create one-of-a-kind designs; and jewelry of 80ft-sheen silver, heavy with stone inlays, massive yet superbly delicate in form--these are the silent but eloquent emissaries that have opened the world's eyes to the native culture of America.

From Dakar to Vientiane, from Brasilia to Tokyo, in United States diplomatic quarters on all continents the State Department's "art in embassies” program is also going American Indian. In New Delhi, for example, Ambassador and Mrs. Chester Bowles display an antique Chilkat (Alaska) blanket, woven of cedar bark and mountain goat wool by an unknown artisan. Because these blankets are so unusual, other Indian tribes often acquired them from the Chilkat for use as ceremonial shawls. The Chilkat blanket keeps company in New Delhi with "The Conquerors," a dramatic painting by a modern Navajo artist, Patsy Miller.

So impressed has officialdom in India been with the American Indian arts and crafts on display there, that the Government of India recently presented to the Institute of American Indian Arts (a Bureau of Indian Affairs school in Santa Fe) a group of Eastern arts and crafts from the dismantled India Pavilion of the New York World's Fair.

The Institute, in turn, is planning an East-West Indian exhibition, with the donated collection to be displayed side by side with American Indian arts and crafts of comparable kinds.

Through the Institute, founded four years ago, the Federal Government is helping preserve end foster the artistry of American Indians. Operated on the premise that self-discovery through art is at least part of the answer to the dropout problem, the Institute has gathered under its adobe rooftops an imposing roster of American Indian teachers who, themselves, have made names in the world of art, music and dance. These teachers are helping Indian and Eskimo teenagers to translate their natural artistic instincts into creative modes of expression.

The results of the Indian art education program have captured the interest of professional schools of art and sculpture, and have singled out the Institute as a fount of prize-winning art and literature. Many of its graduates have moved on, with scholarships, to further study. Some have already established their reputations among art lovers. At exhibitions around the country, the work of Institute artists, sculptors, carvers, potters and designers of textiles and jewelry are met with enthusiasm by critics and collectors. Some of their creations have found their way into international circles - as gifts from the President and Mrs. Johnson to visiting dignitaries.

Merchants in England, France, Germany, and Scandinavian countries have indicated an interest in handling Indian arts and crafts and at home, the biggest department stores in several major cities have already held special exhibition sales.

The reopening in 1964 of the Interior Department's seventh-floor Art Gallery as the setting for what may have been the first major exhibition of American Indian art ever to be shown in the Nation's Capital and the pacesetter for a series of subsequent exhibitions there and in commercial galleries throughout the East.

Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall summed the reason Why Indian art seems to have such universal appeal: "Indian artists possess the gift of sharing the timeless values of Indian culture--love of the land, a tranquil sense of harmony with nature, and the mystique of a time when their people walked here alone. From no other hands and spirits do we receive an artistic contribution more uniquely American."

When the first year's operations under the War on Poverty were summed up recently, the record showed that Indian reservation communities were among the most responsive of all groups to the self-help challenges of the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964.

Projects for young people -- Operation Head Start for the preschoolers and the Neighborhood Youth Corps to help needy high school students stay in school -- have become the most popular EOA activities in Indian communities. The impact of these programs also has led to a growing interest, and demand for participation, in the broader Community Action Programs which call for a heavy measure of local initiative and persistence. Meanwhile, ten Indian areas have agreed to play host to hundreds of unemployed and untrained young men in the Job Corps.

The record of Indian participation in EOA activities to date is as follows:

Neighborhood Youth Corps

More than 15,000 young Indians have been enrolled in these part-time work and part-time study programs designed to put $1.25 per hour into the pockets of needy students and thereby enable them to complete their schooling. The demand at present is greater than current funding can meet; and while 28 Indian communities in 21 States are conducting NYC programs, another 12 communities have asked for funds to enroll an additional 4,000 students.

One Indian leader commented, in pleading for more funds, that the NYC not only provides needy young people with necessary money for personal expenses and family help, but also gives them a chance to discover their way in the working world. NYC enrollees are placed in part-time public service jobs such as hospital aides, assistants in libraries, maintenance helpers in schools, clerks, conservation and reclamation aides, and helpers in daycare centers for children of working mothers.

Operation Head Start

Commenced last 'summer as a means of easing the way for culturally deprived children who would be faced with the fearsome First Grade in September, this program had lived up to its name. All communities report excellent school adjustment on the part of the 1,700 head-starters on the reservations and several thousand others in off-reservation head-start programs.

Since the summer venture, Head Start has now been incorporated into the Community Action Program.

Community Action Programs

Over $7.3 million in grants have thus far been made to 49 Indian reservation communities to launch a variety of self-help community improvement programs. Typical projects planned by the Indians include training for available jobs in the community; surveys of manpower availability; operation of nursery schools for children of working mothers; surveys of educational levels of reservation residents; recreation and physical fitness classes for adults; home management and home care courses for women; community garden projects; and Operation Head Start. More than $1.8 million of CAP money thus far distributed to Indian areas has gone to the Navajos, who constitute about 25 percent of the total Indian population on reservations.

VISTA

At least 235 Volunteers in Service to America (the domestic equivalent of the Peace Corps) have already been assigned to Indian areas, and applications are pending from tribal authorities for nearly as many more. Among the 70 projects now under way by VISTA workers are adult education classes, preschool programs, remedial reading classes, recreation activities and services to agricultural extension workers.

Job Corps

Six of the ten Job Corps Centers scheduled for Indian areas are already activated. They are: Winslow, adjacent to the Navajo Reservation in Arizona; Mexican Springs, on the New Mexico side of the Navajo Reservation; Poston, on the Colorado River Reservation near Phoenix, Arizona; San Carlos, on the San Carlos Apache Reservation in Arizona; Neah Bay on the Makah Reservation in Washington State; and Kicking Horse on the Flathead Reservation in Montana.

Other EOA Programs

Activities under two other provisions of the anti-poverty legislation are moving ahead: Loans to generate small business; and "work experience" programs which combine actual job experience with training for the hard-core untrained-unemployed.

Work experience projects administered under the Bureau of Family Services, Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, are now in operation on the Turtle Mountain Chippewa Reservation on the Canadian border of North Dakota, one of the Indian poverty centers; and on the Fort McDermitt Reservation in Oregon. The loan program for small business is administered by the Small Business Administration, and requires the creation of a Small Business Development Committee as the channeling agency. Thus far, nine loans have been made to Indian groups -- two in Alaska, and seven in Minnesota.

New Activities Under EOA

Indian communities are responding to the Medicare Alert project, fundable under the Economic Opportunity Program, to alert every senior Indian citizen to the importance of registering for medical assistance under the new Medicare legislation.

For the young age group, plans for the Upward Bound program are under way. This program is aimed at disadvantaged high school youth with academic promise. It would provide special college orientation experiences, remedial or enrichment courses designed to give them a start toward higher education. At least 15 tribes have thus far submitted "letters of intent" to the Economic Opportunity Office indicating their desire to participate.