The Word Carrier of Santee Normal Training School (Santee, Nebraska), 1910-05 - 1910-06

              the Word Carrier.
of Santee Normal Training School.
VOLUME XXXIX.
HELPING THE RIGHT, EXPOSING THE WRONG.
NUMBER 3
SANTEE, NEBRASKA.
MAY-JUNE, 1910
THIRTY CENTS PER YEAR
XV:'U  ...
jiULLmr
Birds' Nest
Davis Hall
it Dakota Home   Chapel
Mission House
Carpenter Shop
Blacksmith Shop
Whiti.ey Hall
Hoys' Cottage
Laws, n Cottage
Our   Platform
For Indians we want American Education ! We want American lomesl We want American Flights! The result of which is
Am can Citizenship! And the Gospel is the Power of God for
their Salvation I
The Dakota Home Burned
HISTORY
The Dakota Home was erected in the summer
of 1872, but was not finished uutilthe next
Bummer. Later it had quite an extension to
the south. At first the interior was finished
with rosin board and paint but subsequently
the lower story was plastered. It has been re-
roofed twice during the thirty-eight years.
The last new roof was put on only last summer.
An incident of its first year of life was the
housing of the entire South Dakota General Association when it met at Santee in May 1873.
The building was not then finished and sheets
were hung up to separate the rooms of the
guests.
It would have been opened in the fall of
1873, but the small pox came to the Agency and
suspended everything for three months. The
pupils were gathered in December 22, 1873.
Since its opening at this date it has given home
and training to 458 young women. At first
the girls found it quite irksome being confined
to the grounds. Especially when summer came
it wore out tbe lives of the principal aud matrons
in keeping them in sight. Near the school was
an abandoned field grown up in sunflowers, and
often there was a stampede to the sunflower
patch where they were effectually lost until the
wild fit had subsided.
Until the common dining room in Davis
Hall was opened in 1886, each dormitory had
its own kitchen and dining room. So for the
first thirteen years there were two ladies in
charge of the Home. In all twenty ladies
have served in this capacity from the first until
now.
The name Dakota Home was given to it by
The American Board, by whom it was built.
It was a favorite name for their girls schools;
like the Constantinople Home that also burned
[down not very long ago. In years past there
I was some pleasant correspondence between the
\ girls of our Dakota Home and The Constanti-
i nople  Home.
THE   FIRE
Quite often during the Spring the smoke of
prairie fires has clouded the horizon by day
and their flames have brightened it by night,
so that the idea of fire has not been absent
from our thoughts, but to be suddenly aroused
from sound sleep in the dead of night and
compelled instantly to escape from a burning
house is a different experience and very terrifying. Such was the necessity upon the matron and the twenty-eight girls in the Dakota
Home on Wednesday morning about, one o'clock
May 4th. They had time to save scarcely anything except as they snatched up what came to
hand first; one girl carried out a spool of
thread, another a thimble. So quick was the
impromtu fire brigade that the first sheet of
flame which had burst out on the second
floor west side, was apparently controlled, but
it only gave place to ominously black smoke
which rolled thicker, until red flames flashed
through the smoke not only on the side but
from the whole front. In an incredibly short
time the roof and rafters were crashing down
onto the second floor whose beams in turn gave
way dropping writhing and twisted iron beds
on the ground floor, where in company with
toppling stoves and sewing machine frames
etc. they took the final plunge into the cellar.
As soon as it was seen that the fire had grown
beyond control, attention was turned to the
neighboring buildings. Altho there was a good
wind blowing that night, it did not endanger
the nearest buildings after they were water-
soaked. The Boys' Cottage which was in the
path of the sparks and flying embers was far
enough off to enable a small body of men and
boys, with ladders, to successfully protect it.
The swing rope which hung on a tree at the
corner of the Home was curiously enough not
scorched altho the fire played up and down the
side of the tree trunk near the fire.
The first look at the smoking ruins in morning light brought depression, but this feeling
has given place to a hearty thankfulness that
the blackened heap is not the grave of any of
our girls, and to a lively hope that the ruined
state is merely a chrysalis stage from which the
old Dakota Home purified by fire, will rise to
continue its mission of bringing larger usefulness and beauty of life to Indian girls.
OUR   NEEDS
"We look to our many friends for help. Even
the smallest contributions will be an added assurance that the Dakota Home can be rebuilt
and furnished.
Whatever arrangements and accomodations
can be made for taking back the older girls next
September will depend on what can be gathered together this summer in the way of bedding
and necessary furnishings.
In bedding we will need: 60 double, 30 single sheets; 80 pillow cases; 160 towels and
wash cloths ; 40 pillows; 40 double blankets;
40 comforters.
For temporary accommodations at the opening of the school year we will need $250 for
bedsteads, chairs and furnishings, which could
later be used in the new building.
In second hand clothing what will be most
useful is warm underclothes, wraps, dress skirts
and shirt waists.
The greatest need is for a new building. This
will require $3,500 above the insurance.
Our Mission for California  Indians
By vote of the Executive Committee of the
American Missionary Association $500. is
granted for supporting a missionary among the
Indians of Northern California. This missionary will be also under Home Missionary appointment and will be dividing his time between
whites and Indians. This is sure to make the
plan a failure from the start. The mission
will be started in Modoc County, iu the neighborhood of Alturas. Rev. Geo. W. Hinman
District Secretary of A. M. A. San Francisco,
will have supervision of the new mission. If
the Congregational churches of California are
in earnest about this matter they will provide
a whole man and not half a man for this work.