Ignored Tribe A Step Closer To Recognition Long-Scattered Little Shell Chippewa Indians Pushing For Federal Tribal Status

From Spokane to Dagmar in the northeast corner of Montana, the Little Shell Chippewa Indians have the same problem: no recognition, no respect.

No land.

Not since 1892, when Chief Little Shell rejected the “Ten Cent Treaty” that stripped 10 million acres from the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation of north-central North Dakota for about 10 cents an acre.

After that, many of Little Shell’s followers were scattered in shantytowns at the edges of cities all across Montana. It was like the Jewish and Palestinian diasporas, tribal Secretary-Treasurer James Parker Shield said last week in Spokane.

Now, though, he said the tribe may be on the verge of gaining federal recognition.

“It has been a prayer every day,” said tribal member Patti Piapot of Spokane.

Parker Shield, 45, of Great Falls, Mont., is running for tribal chairman in an election that likely will determine who leads the Little Shells into the “promised land” of federal tribal status. He addressed about 15 tribal members here as part of a campaign tour.

No one is sure how many Little Shells live in this area because the tribe can’t afford to track its members. Parker Shield had estimated 60 to 100, but Spokane resident Mary Jane Miller - citing relatives of some of the people who came to hear Parker Shield - figured there could be several hundred.

Most tribal members live in north-central Montana. Volunteers maintain an office in Great Falls. They have about 4,000 enrolled members and about 350 applications are pending.

Among those whose applications are pending is Parker Shield’s sister, Karla Raya of Tum Tum. Because of the tribe’s informal relationship with the federal government, she is not yet an enrolled tribal member even though Parker Shield and another full brother are enrolled.

“It’s been a long struggle,” Parker Shield said. “Our people have all the disadvantages of being Indians, but we don’t have any of the so-called advantages.”

They are victims of prejudice and poverty but don’t get federal health and housing benefits, he said.

Piapot agreed: “Around here, we can’t even get our foot into (Indian Health Service clinics at) Wellpinit, Lapwai or Plummer. I’m tired of being an orphan.”

The clinics are set up to serve Indians who bear the federal stamp of approval.

Unfortunately, Parker Shield said, the Little Shells sometimes don’t even have an Indian stamp of approval.

“I won’t name names, but other Indians treat us like second-class citizens,” he said, and some members of his audience nodded in agreement. “Other Indians look down on us because we’re landless, and say we’re not Indian enough.”

Pointing to his heart, he added, “To me, what makes you Indian is right here.”

That’s where it has to be because history has largely ignored the Little Shells. Parker Shield said he was pleased when one book devoted a page to the tribe in a chapter titled “Those Who Even Time Forgot.”

“It made me very proud because nobody ever writes about us,” Parker Shield said.

Miller agreed: “People say, ‘Who?’ We need some bumper stickers that say ‘Little Shell.”’

The Little Shells are composed of two groups thrown together by history: full-blooded Pembina Chippewas and Chippewas who were known as Metis (French for half-breed) because they intermarried with French fur traders and established a new culture.

Originally from the northern Great Lakes area, many of the Metis pushed onto the northern Great Plains as white settlers poured into their homeland. By the early 1800s, they were firmly established along the Red River in what is now northern North Dakota and southern Manitoba.

When much of their land was annexed by Canada in 1869, some of the Metis participated in a short-lived rebellion led by a Metis named Louis Riel. After that, some of the Metis joined full-blooded Chippewas in North Dakota’s Turtle Mountains while others fled to Montana.

Still more fled to Montana after another unsuccessful rebellion in 1885. Among the political refugees were some of the followers of Chief Little Shell. He and his son, Chief Thomas Little Shell, led the rest of the band into Montana and Saskatchewan when their reservation land was taken.

U.S. officials in Montana considered the Little Shell Chippewas to be Canadian Indians and deported many of them.

“They sent our people away in Montana, just like they did the Jews, and put us on cattle cars and shipped us back to Canada,” Parker Shield said.

Those who remained were relegated to impoverished camps at the edge of Montana’s cities, a condition that persisted well into this century.

“My first memories are of Skid Row in Great Falls and a lot of drinking, ” Parker Shield said. “Me and my brother and sister got thrown away when I was 5 years old.” He said he “learned to hustle at a very young age” and was jailed for car theft when he was 17. Since then, he’s studied history and education at the University of Great Falls and has held a variety of governmental administrative jobs. Among other things, he was an aide to former Montana Gov. Ted Schwinden.

Now Parker Shield hopes to follow in the footsteps of Joseph Dussome, who led the Little Shell tribe from 1927 to 1963. Dussome doggedly pursued federal recognition and established the necessary proof that the government has dealt with the tribe over the years.

The government already has paid the tribe $2.2 million for the land it lost, but Parker Shield said the tribe isn’t allowed to use the money until it gains formal recognition. Until then, the money is being held in trust.

He said the Little Shells probably never will have a reservation. But he hopes to acquire enough land for a cultural center so tribal members could learn their history, study their genealogy and feel they are part of something. “That’s what I dream for,” he said.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo