Two little girls are standing on the shore of a lake; both girls are wearing hair ribbons. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
Two unidentified Ojibwe men are seated with their backs to the camera. They men are wearing decorated garments, roaches, feathers, and beaded bandolier bags. A large group of people are visible in the background. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Clara Stocker, Stella's adult daughter, accompanied her on this camping trip. Stella Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
A view from the Nett Lake Ojibwe dance lodge. A number of houses are in the distance. The low structures in the foreground may be grave houses. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
A view of Nett Lake from the shore looking toward what photographer Stella Stocker calls Ghost Island, also known as Spirit Island. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
A number of tipis as well as the framing for a medicine lodge are visible in the landscape. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
View of a lake and wooded areas in White Earth, Minnesota. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
A camp with a tent, another shelter, and a clothesline. John and Mabel (Soreyes) Wakemup lived at Nett Lake. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.�
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
A view of an unidentified village on a lake, located on the White Earth Ojibwe reservation. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
An Ojibwe woman is stirring a pot parching wild rice, a birch bark basket is visible in the foreground. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
An unidentified Ojibwe woman is standing outside a tent. Household items including blankets, wash pan, buckets, and cooking utensils are on tables and the ground at the campsite. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
Two unidentified Ojibwe women are seated in the grass at the door of a tent while one woman leans against a tree. A dog is sitting with them. On the left is a canvas covered tipi. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
A small group of women are facing the drum and drummers at the Annual White Earth Celebration and Pow Wow. This snapshot by Stella Stocker is from her photograph album. Stocker, a musician and music educator, studied American Indian music among the Ojibwe people in Minnesota.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
Magee-Macoons (Robert Strong), enrolled Bois Forte elder is speaking Ojibwe, his first language, in an interview for a television documentary on the history and culture of Lake Superior Anishinaabe. Mr. Strong addresses the importance of the Ojibwe language and its survival for the younger generation. He tells a story in Ojibwe.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth Kathryn A. Martin Library, University Archives
Waagosh (Anton Treuer), Bemidji State University Professor of Languages and Ethnic Studies, Indian Studies, and Director of American Indian Resource Center, an enrolled member of the Leech Lake Ojibwe, is speaking Ojibwe in an interview for a television documentary on the history and culture of Lake Superior Anishinaabe. Dr. Treuer stated: "Approximately ten years ago I did not know how to speak Indian. But now when I lay down to sleep in the evening I dream in Indian."
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth Kathryn A. Martin Library, University Archives
Waagosh (Anton Treuer), Bemidji State University Professor of Languages and Ethnic Studies, Indian Studies, and Director of American Indian Resource Center, an enrolled member of the Leech Lake Ojibwe, is speaking Ojibwe in an interview for a television documentary on the history and culture of Lake Superior Anishinaabe. Dr. Treuer stated: "Approximately ten years ago I did not know how to speak Indian. But now when I lay down to sleep in the evening I dream in Indian."
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth Kathryn A. Martin Library, University Archives
The members of the U.S. Steel Traffic Committee visited the Indian School at Lake Vermilion. They posed with some of the students and staff in front of the school.
Mrs. Jessie C. Yeats' Chippewa Indian (Ojibwe) collection that was given to the Pittsfield, Massachusetts, museum by Johnn K. West from Detroit, Minnesota (became Detroit Lakes, Minnesota, in 1926).
St. Benedict's Mission, White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). One of the boarding school dormitories in the upper floors of the newly-built St. Benedict's Mission School. Unlike the crowded conditions of the early convent school at White Earth, the new school built in 1890 allowed ample space for sleeping quarters (Saint Benedict's Monastery Archives).
St. Benedict's Mission, White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). Students pose with their handiwork in the work room of the newly-built school at St. Benedict's Mission. Domestic arts were considered important. So before and after school hours, the girls were taught to card wool and spin yarn with which they knitted their own stockings. They were taught plain and fancy sewing and took turns in assisting the sisters in the kitchen, laundry and dairy. Under Sister Philomena Ketten's supervision, the boys worked in the garden and helped on the farm with picking potatoes and raking hay. [SBMA, McDonald, p. 241]
St. Benedict's Mission, White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). The newly-built school was completed in 1892. The school day at St. Benedict's School in White Earth was similar to that of any other American school with hours from 9:00 until 4:00 in teaching the basic learning skills. This daily rigid pattern was not a part of the American Indian culture and tested the endurance of both the students and teachers, but music and singing and manual work offered relief. [SBMA, McDonald, p. 241]
St. Mary's Mission, Red Lake Indian Reservation (Red Lake Nation). The Benedictine monks and sisters were preceded in the Red Lake mission by Fathers Francis Xavier Pierz and Lawrence Lautischar. These two missionaries had founded the mission in the 1850s and Father Lautischar remained there as its first pastor. After his untimely death in a snowstorm, Father Lawrence was succeeded by Father Ignatius Tomazin, the Yugoslav missionary who was removed from White Earth for antagonizing government agents at that reservation in1878. In 1883, his zeal for the rights of the American Indians once again brought the soldiers from Fort Snelling to the reservation to remove him. For the next five years, the Red Lake mission was without a priest. In 1888, when the Drexel sisters* paid a visit to the reservation and heard the Ojibwe's plea for priests and sisters, Katherine begged the abbot of St. John's Abbey to take over the mission. She offered to pay the traveling expenses and to rent temporary buildings for them. The following year in November 1889, two priests, Fathers Simon Lampe and Thomas Borgerding from St. John's Abbey and Sisters Amalia Eich and Evangelista McNulty from St. Benedict's Convent made the arduous trip to Red Lake; the last lap from White Earth to Red Lake was by lumber wagons. St. Mary's Mission in Red Lake began in some empty buildings on the reservation. The sisters converted an abandoned Hudson Bay Company's warehouse into a school. In spite of its poor condition, the school opened with an enrollment of 25 day pupils. Years later when Sister Amalia was asked how they kept warm in that drafty house, she replied that they didn't keep warm; they froze. The next spring they took in 27 boarding pupils in addition to the day students. St. Benedict's sent two more sisters and a candidate to help. The candidate, Jane Horn, who later became Sister Marciana, was a former pupil of the sisters at White Earth. She was a helpful bridge for building understanding between the missionaries and the Ojibwe at Red Lake. (*Katherine Drexel and her two sisters, daughters of a wealthy banker in Philadelphia, engaged in charity for the American Indian and African American missions.) [SBMA McDonald, pp. 246-249 Sister Owen Lindblad, OSB, FULL OF FAIR HOPE: A History of St. Mary's Mission, Red Lake, (Park Press Quality Printing, Inc., Waite Park, MN, 1997), pp. 15-17, 34-39]
In 1930, Bishop Peter Bartholme of the Diocese of St. Cloud asked Sister Laura Hesch, OSB, to set up a mission to serve the Ojibwe on the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe). Holy Cross Convent in Onamia served as her home base from which she set out 11 miles several times a week to be with the Ojibwe.
In 1944, a small center for Sister Laura Hesch's mission work was built at Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe). She called it Little Flower Inn.
Sister Laura Hesch, OSB, visited Ojibwe in many of their activities, such as making maple syrup at the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe).
Hand-drawn map shows location of residences and owner names, churches, National Monument, school, trading post, and ranger station in community of Grand Portage, Minnesota.
St. Benedict's Mission, White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). St. Benedict's mission at White Earth thrived; more and more orphans were crowded into the convent quarters and the day school's enrollment increased. With the help of St. John's Abbey, a new church and a convent school were built in 1881-1882. The convent school, called St. Benedict's Girls Orphan School, was built for 30 orphans; classrooms were built in the ground floor of the new church. Though unaware and unprepared for the cultural sensitivity that would have been desirable in undertaking such a venture as the Indian missions, the sisters shared what they best understood -- education and friendship -- with the Ojibwe who were relegated to reservations in the mid 1800s. There, as in the German and Polish settlements which they served, they staffed schools and taught the basic learning skills, music, domestic arts, and religion. Hindsight reveals the injustice of the American government and of the early settlers in land settlements and in the expectation that American Indians must learn to live, talk, believe and look like the whites who took over the country. For example, the sisters were required to use only the English language in school. However, homey exceptions to that occurred in the life on the mission as the sisters lived, worked and played with the Ojibwe children and learned from them the native language, traditions and life values that in turn enriched the sisters. [SBMA]
St. Benedict's Mission, White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). The school at White Earth was so successful that it was noticed by Katherine Drexel who lived in Philadelphia and had devoted her life to working for American Indians and African Americans. (She later founded the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament for the education of these minorities.) Katherine visited White Earth with her two sisters and was so impressed by the work of the Benedictines there that she made arrangements for the building of a new school that would house 150 orphaned and dependent children. During the summer of 1890, the bricks for this four-story building were made near the mission and in the winter months, the lumber and other materials were gathered. Two years later, February 10, 1892, the school was opened for 100 children with the expectation that government funds were available to educate and cloth them. By 1895, the enrollment had grown to 150; the number of teachers and helpers grew to eighteen over the years. However, when government funding was rescinded by the turn of the century, the school faced the challenge of survival. The Benedictines turned to the charity of the Catholics of the Northwest Territory, of St. John's Abbey and of St. Benedict's Convent, and most of all, to tribal funds that the government had held in trust for them in lieu of the land they had given up. These funds could be requested by the Ojibwe as needed. In this way, St. Benedict's Mission managed to continue the boarding school until 1945. When the tribal funds were no longer available, the school became a parochial day school. [SBMA, McDonald, pp. 241-246]
The first concern for Sister Laura Hesch when she began her mission on the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe) was to get acquainted with the Ojibwe. She made her way to families and visited them in their homes on the reservation. The Ojibwe developed a faithful friendship with and a trust in Sister Laura--so much so that they requested she be buried on the reservation when she died.
Ojibwe homes along the shores of Mille Lacs Lake at Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe). Sister Laura Hesch made regular visits. Her outgoing personality soon won the trust of the people she came to be with as is evident by the fact that thirty two mothers came to the first Mothers' Party which she hosted.
Some sources say the community was named for Tom Penasse, an American Indian from the area, who may be the man pictured. The sign reads, "United States Post Office Penasse Minnesota, The Most Northerly P.O. in U.S.A." Penasse, Minnesota is located in the northern part of Minnesota's Northwest Angle in Lake of the Woods County.
Contributing Institution:
University of Minnesota Duluth, Kathryn A. Martin Library, Northeast Minnesota Historical Collections
St. Benedict's Mission, White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). The traditional festive attire was an important part of all Indian celebrations at the White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe) (Saint Benedict's Monastery Archives).
St. Mary's Mission, Red Lake Indian Reservation (Red Lake Nation). This panoramic view of St. Mary's Mission shows the outlay of buildings and the extent of the farm and gardens around 1909. Records reveal the great amount of produce that supported the mission. For example, one summer 1,800 bushels of potatoes and 600 bushels of corn were harvested. The horses, cattle, and chickens were all important in the survival of life on the mission. Red Lake mission prospered despite the early trials of hunger, cold and destructive fires. The sisters maintained an enrollment of 80-100 pupils in the boarding school during the next 50 years. [SBMA, Lindblad, p. 72]
William Knickbocher stands in a rice kettle. Knickbocher appears to be treading on parched wild rice to remove the rice hulls. Two birchbark winnowing trays are visible. William Knickbocher died in the fall of 1958.
In 1949, Sister Laura Hesch oversaw the clearing of the ground in preparation for the construction of the Little Flower Mission Church at the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe). The building was built the following year under the supervison of the Crosier Fathers of Onamia.
St. Mary's Mission, Red Lake Indian Reservation (Red Lake Nation). In 1904, fire destroyed the temporary church that had been converted to a boys' dormitory. A year later, the sisters' and girls' first house was also destroyed by fire (see photo). The wood-burning stoves were a constant hazard for the early pioneers. In one of his letters, Father Thomas Borgerding, OSB, describes the agony of not being able to save the building because of the intense wind. Father Thomas wrote to Katherine Drexel requesting funds and she responded with an $800 donation. Using 30,000 feet of lumber stored at the mission, a new building was built by 1905 which housed the boys' residence on the upper level and the sisters and girls on the lower level. By 1906, construction was begun for the sisters and girls' residence and was completed after many summers. [SBMA Lindblad, p. 54-58]
Sister Laura Hesch gathered her first group of about 40 Ojibwe children for formal worship at the John Bugg home in October, 1942 at the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe).
In return for her hospitality, Sister Laura Hesch is invited by an Ojibwe woman to share a meal at the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe).
Until Sister Laura Hesch was given a larger mission center for her activities Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe), she met with Ojibwe children wherever she found them.
Sister Laura Hesch had a way with children at the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe). She often treated them with a lunch when she taught them.
Before Sister Laura Hesch could establish a mission center on Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe), she taught Ojibwe children at their homes. Her motherly affection for children soon won their hearts.
Sister Laura Hesch befriended a 100-year-old Ojibwe woman who lived alone on the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe). It was through such relationships that she won the hearts of the Ojibwe.
Sister Laura made inroads into life of reservation by making friends with the Ojibwe children who loved the treats she brought when she visited Mille Lacs Indian Reservation (Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe).
St. Benedict's Mission, White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). Sister Lioba Braun, at the organ, leads the sisters at St. Benedict's Mission in song. Sister Lioba, one of the first sisters to help establish St. Benedict's Mission at White Earth, brought her gift of music and singing and soon had a choir that was able to sing at the religious services. The sister to the immediate right of Sister Lioba is identified as Sister Meinrad Burrell and the sister to Sister Meinrad's right as Sister Basilia Cosgrove. [SBMA]
St. Benedict's Mission, White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). After the missionaries had settled in White Earth and had begun to build a new church and school, the Ojibwe of Buffalo River (Callaway), eight miles away, asked Father Aloysius Hermanutz to send them teachers for their children. Rather than refuse, Father Aloysius promised he would do so if they built a school. He believed that they would be unable to provide a building. However, when they did offer a place for the school, Sister Philomena saved Father Aloysius' embarrassment by offering to ride daily to Buffalo River to teach if Father would lend her his pony. After some mishaps in riding strange horses when Father Aloysius needed his, Sister Philomena begged for a pony of her own which she received. She was also able to convince the bishop to provide her with a saddle. [SBMA, McDonald, pp. 237-238]
St. Mary's Mission, Red Lake Indian Reservation (Red Lake Nation). Sisters and students pose on the porch of the convent/school. In 1889, with a donation received from the Drexel sisters, a convent/boarding school was built. Upstairs were sleeping quarters for the sisters and girls; downstairs contained the kitchen, recreation room, and refectory for serving meals. At the time there were five sisters, 35 boarding students of ages six to eighteen, and 25 day students. It proved to be so successful that it had to be enlarged within two years. A house was purchased to be the dormitory for boys and the temporary church (built in 1891) served as the dormitory for boys after a new church was completed in 1893. [SBMA; Lindblad, pp. 41-43]
St. Benedict's Mission, White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). Survival was the sisters' prime challenge during those first years of exposure to cold and scarcity of food in White Earth. But even so, they took two orphan girls (the younger one only four years old) into their home. The care of orphans was to become an important work for them at St. Benedict's Mission as White Earth developed. Sisters Philomena and Lioba, unlike in temperaments, proved to be well-suited to work together among the Ojibwe. Sister Philomena, young and vivacious, had volunteered for missionary work; Sister Lioba, deliberate and more conservative, was fearful of venturing that far into the northern region. They learned to rely on each other's strengths and persevered through 50 years of mission work at the White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). Records indicate that, when a fire destroyed the school just a few weeks after their arrival, Sister Lioba felt justified in going back home, but Sister Philomena suggested fixing up the barn to serve as the school, which they did at a cost of $35.00. [SBMA, McDonald, pp. 232-237]
St. Benedict's Mission, White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). The complex of buildings comprising St. Benedict's Mission in White Earth as viewed from the lake in the early 1890s. By 1895, the mission had reached the peak of its development because that year the federal government reversed its policy of giving aid for education on the reservations and set 1899 as the final date after which no more public money would be given. [SBMA]
St. Benedict's Mission, White Earth Indian Reservation (White Earth Band of Ojibwe). About 85 boarding students and six sisters posed in the inner court of St. St. Benedict's Mission School in the early 1890s. Record keeping for this large a group of children was not simple. While the churches constructed and operated the schools on the reservations, government policy allowed the schools an annual appropriation of a flat rate for tuition, board and clothing annually; the amount varied from $100 to $150 per pupil. This policy required careful quarterly reports to be sent to Washington. All expenditures had to be accounted for - the number of pounds of meat, sacks of flour, bushels of beans and potatoes, barrels of sugar, pounds of rice, and gallons of syrup and soap These accounts show the frugality of the mission school's fare. For example, the 1886 end-of-year record shows $2.00 for candy and $2.50 for a pair of geese. [SBMA, McDonald, pp. 240-241]
St. Mary's Mission, Red Lake Indian Reservation (Red Lake Band of Chippewa). "Traditionally the governmental structure of the Ojibwe was based on adherence to an hereditary clan chieftainship among the people, and the right to participate in clan decisions was an inherited right" (Lindblad, page 78). They did what they could to keep friendly relations with government agencies, traders, lumbermen and missionaries, while preserving their status of the reservation as a "closed reservation." The people of the Red Lake Indian Reservation themselves insisted on this status to protect their autonomy and food source. It took years for the American people to realize the injustices that were inflicted upon the Americans Indians. The Ojibwe's efforts at revitalizing their culture attest to their dignity and resilience as a people (SBMA Lindlbad, page 78).
