“No one has ever asked me before,” the elder explained.
“She was answering my question about why she had never told anyone about the abuse she suffered at Indian boarding school,” recalls Denise Lajimodiere, professor of Education at North Dakota State University in Fargo.
Lajimodiere, who also serves as president of the Boarding School Healing Coalition , found that the other survivors she interviewed told her the same thing. “Most of them had never even told their families,’ she says of interviewees who often whispered when sharing details of the sexual abuse they experienced at the schools.
Lajimodiere, a member of the Turtle Mountain Chippewa tribe, is working on a book containing ten of the most powerful survivor stories she’s collected over the past few years. “I don’t want the book to be academic; I want it to be their voices telling their stories.”
Her journey into the world of boarding schools and the unresolved trauma associated with them began as a means to reconcile with her father, who attended Chemawa boarding school in Oregon. “I wanted to figure out my Dad’s violence and find a way to forgive him,” she says.
Boarding School Healing Coalition
After seeing an advertisement that the Boarding School Healing Project , an organization that predated the Coalition, wanted researchers, she applied and began interviewing survivors in North Dakota. “I went all over the state, conducting the interviews in keeping with traditional ways as much as I could. Afterwards, I’d go outside and sit in my car and cry.”
Lajimodiere says her research about responses to unresolved trauma and hearing the stories of survivors helped her understand her parents, their harshness and lack of affection. (Her mother attended boarding school in Wahpeton.) “They weren’t parented, they were just beaten.
“When I read that unresolved grieving is mourning that has not been completed, with the ensuing depressions being absorbed by children from birth onward, I felt like I had been punched in the gut. Years ago I had come across the term ‘adult child of an alcoholic,’ and was shocked to realize that it defined me. Once again, upon hearing the terms and seeing the definitions of generational trauma and unresolved grieving, I thought, “My god that is me; it is my family, my brother, my sister, aunts, uncles, grandparents,” she wrote in the essay “ A Healing Journey ,” published in the Wicazo Sa Review.
Lajimodiere recalls an incident with her father after she began researching the boarding school experience. “One day, about a year before he died, I brought the documentary In the White Man’s Image for my father to watch. The video spoke of the government’s attempt to stamp out American Indian culture, language, tradition, stories, and ceremonies. It reviewed the background of Captain Richard Pratt and detailed his educational experiment designed to transform the Indian into the white man’s image. Pratt’s first school, in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, was profiled, and the second school, in Chemawa, near Salem, Oregon, where my father was sent, was mentioned. The video documented the use of whistles, bells, bugles, and military-style punishment and daily regiment, the building of guard houses on school campuses, kids dying of homesickness, disease, and poor nutrition. The narrator said that boarding schools left a legacy of confused and lonely children.
Boarding School Healing Coalition
Captain Richard Pratt designed boarding schools to transform the Indian into the white man’s image. His first was Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
“Following the video, and after a long silence, with head in hands, he said softly, ‘So that’s what the goddamn hell they were trying to do to us.’ The power and impact of his words slammed into me and I sat trembling, fighting back tears, unable to say a word, unable to comfort him. He had never learned, throughout his entire life, about the government’s assimilation policy, why he was stolen, why his hair was shaved off, why he was beaten for speaking Cree, why he had Christianity forced on him. This was his soul wound,” she wrote in “ A Healing Journey .”
She learned that her father nearly died from a beating at Chemawa and that her mother was routinely locked in a closet during her boarding school days.
Learning about her parents experiences and hearing their stories has helped her and her family. “I had to forgive my parents after I understood what happened to them.”
Oregon State Library
Classes at Chemewa began with 18 students—14 boys and 4 girls—all from the Puyallup Reservation.
She hopes her work will lead others to understanding, forgiveness and ultimately healing. “Before reconciling with the U.S government, we need to reconcile among ourselves first,” she says, adding that Native peoples need to create their own means to address internalized racism and the impact of historical trauma. “No one can do it for us; we have to do it for ourselves.”
She argues that the government has a legal and moral obligation to support those efforts. “My hope is to see monies flood in from the U.S. government in support of healing that is specific to historical trauma especially relating to boarding schools. We need counselors who are trained in the history of boarding schools, the losses or heritage, land and family.”
She hopes to see a time when survivors and their families can have access to a safe place in which to tell their stories. “Documenting survivors stories helps create connective tissue between what happened to them and what is happening in Indian country today. Allowing them to tell their stories also provides a platform to demonstrate the courage and resilience of Native peoples.”
Lajimodiere continues her work with the Coalition, which includes documenting survivor stories, but often finds it emotionally exhausting. “I have to take mini-breaks and care for my own psyche,” she says.
For instance, she recently received her mother’s records from Wahpeton but has not yet been able to open the envelope. “I know I will when I am ready,” she says.
This project is made possible by support from The Rosalynn Carter Fellowships for Mental Health Journalism and Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism , University of Southern California; the Dennis A. Hunt Fund for Health Journalism .
This story was originally published on June 29, 2015 .
For those of you who think that the Indian Boarding Schools ended in the 19th century the reality of it is the last of these ''schools'' closed in the 1980's. For over 100 years tens of thousands of Indian children were subject to horrors that few can imagine.
The Wahpeton Indian School (off rez boarding school) is mentioned in the article. It's located in the North Dakota town of Wahpeton on the North Dakota Minnesota border, across the river from Breckenridge Minnesota. The towns are divided by the Otter Tail River and the Bois de Sioux river where they meet to form the Red River.
These ''schools'' were overseen by the BIA who delegated the running of the vast majority of them to Christian denominations.
To call them schools is a joke, they were prisons and the ''students'' were treated worse than any prison in the U.S.
Abuse, both physical and sexual was rampant in the majority of the schools. You were taught little more they how to be a servant or work in the fields. In fact in the summer months you were ''rented out'' to local farmers to work their fields. Of course the school got the money the Indian children got the beatings.
Many Indian children died at these schools and many of their graves had no headstone nor record of how or when they died. Parents generally were never notified of the deaths.
The U.S. has never acknowledged this part of history nor accepted what the government and Christian overseers did.
At Wahpeton Indian school some leaders of the AIM movement were ''students'' there. Dennis Banks, Russell Means and Floyd ''Crow'' Westerman among others.
Canada had their ''Residential Schools'', they were modeled after the U.S. Indian Boarding Schools. The one difference is that Canada has faced up to what they did to Indian children. In detailed examination of the records the Canadian government concluded over 6,000 First Nations children died in these schools. Disease was rampant with little medical help. Sadly the U.S. never has and IMO never will admit this tragedy.
When you arrived at the school, the first thing that was done was to cut all your hair off, take your clothes and given proper whiteman's clothes. Next came the beating, if you spoke your native language you were beaten. Many times with a closed fist or rod, the beating left many children on the verge of death. You were beaten if you mentioned in anyway your heritage. ''Kill the Indian, save the Man'' was the order of the day, of and of course make good Christians out of you.
Does this sound like BS, trust me it isn't. There are now many reports and studies that have exposed this horror, yet many Americans have no idea that this went on.
Today Wahpeton Indian School has been renamed to "All Nations School'' and is run by the tribes themselves. The past still hangs in the air, never to be forgotten.
A great and informative article, Kavika. There are many things that happened to the children of Native Americans at the hands of the white man, and often done in the name of God, that go well beyond inhumanity. There will also be many who were never aware such things ever could happen in America and will learn the truth, and those who will totally deny that they ever happened as they either don't care, or refuse to accept the fact that such things ever happened.
Hopefully, this will be a learning of what innocent Native American children suffered for many years for those who have never been aware of such events. And, hopefully, they will make sure nothing like it ever happens again in our country. As then it was Native American children, today or tomorrow it could be Mexican, Muslim or even Asian children out of fear and resentment.
Just my own thoughts.
If we don't learn from history, we will repeat it RW.
That is the great truth that most wish to run away from....
But the truth always has a way of catching up, sooner or later.....
There has been way too much evil done in the name of christ, way too much.
Excellent article.
I agree, Kavika. And from what I see happening in our country today, where an entire race of people are being unilaterally condemned as undesirables seriously reminds me when Native Americans faced the same condemnation, and still are in many places here in the US even today. Now the Muslims and Mexicans are the ones facing expulsion and threats as an undesirable people, promoted by the political and religious zealots who obviously feel that America should only be a pure white country. As well as setting race against race, an even bigger threat to common decency, respect, tolerance and acceptance.
It truly saddens my heart to see that the land of the free, the hope and dreams of so many, has failed them so greatly.
Just my own thoughts.
Dear Friend Kavika: I concur with our good friend Raven Wing.
Important article you shared with us.
A must read.
And where ever children, their well being, family, and heritage is affected this reminds us to be ever on watch.
Never again should any child be used, abused, or exploited in any way.
That is wrong as wrong can be.
Onward and Upward.
Enoch.
Agree niijii.
Leaving a comment so I can come back to it-- It's necessary!
Marking so I can find this later. Kavika, I remember reading a book, or maybe short story, about this in high school, but for the life of me I can't remember the title or author. So you have any idea what it might have been?
Sorry but I don't know of any such book or paper depending on the time frame you're talking about. Lately there have been some stories/papers/books on it.
I can't remember when it was written, but I graduated in '92, so sometime before that. Quite a while before that, probably, for it to have made it into a public school curriculum as required reading.
Well, maybe I'll come up with it. I remember that it made me think.
Possibly Vine Deloria, he wrote some papers on it.
There were many others also Kav as I'm sure you are aware after the late '70's
Vine was one of the first great ones though.
I looked him up, and nothing really seems to fit.
Anyway, these schools were something I'd never heard of until I read that book. I certainly knew by high school that our nation had frequently been on the wrong side of racial issues, but I hadn't realized how recently mistreatment of Native Americans was still written into our laws.
Shameful episodes in American history.
I would like to see a good, big budget Hollywood movie about this topic, similar to "Twelve Years A Slave" or some such film. That would be the best, most effective way to call attention to this sad story and make it known to the masses of Americans.
It would be great if they did make a movie out of this sad period in our history. Will it happen, I doubt it JR.
It awful to think that these children were robbed of their families and robbed of their traditions and treated as less than human. It is a dark mark on our history that this was allowed and even encouraged. It is unforgivable to do this to children, but first I guess the institutions involved would have had to identify them as human.
My heart goes out to those who survived the end of this period, since they are all seniors now.
And the parents were as traumatized as well. Their children taken from them by force or threat of arrest. Not know if your child survived or where he/she is.
Many parents lives were destroyed because of this as well Perrie.
The abuse of children is documented throughout the world. In England, for sure. When my grandmother was widowed at the age of 30 with four children there were few options opened to her. One of them being....wards of the court going to a home. A man who she met while doing domestic work at the local hotel offered to marry her. She did.
My two older aunts left their home while teenagers because this stepfather wandered into their beds at night. There are worse things than being punched in the belly.
My Mother was never abused by him, but she is the one who told me the story.
Mags,
Yes child abuse is worldwide, but what Kavika is addressing specifically is government sanctioned abuse of a specific group of children, to make sure that their culture ended. It goes above and beyond general child abuse because it's purpose was not only slave labor but also to do away with a whole people.
This has happened in other countries, like Australia and Canada ( as mentioned) and even Hawaii, and it was always to not only christianize who them deemed pagans but also to rid themselves of those people.
That is a very specific goal and one I am sure we can all agree is evil.
You should watch the movie "Rabbit Proof Fence" about what happened in Australia. It is a true story.
Here is a link where you can watch it for $1.99
Downloading it now, will see if I can post it.
Have seen the movie Perrie. It is excellent.
Yes it was a really fine film. Really sad to see children suffer that way
Thank you NWM.
It is a very good movie. Having lived in Australia, the treatment of the indigenous people there was and still is horrible. The killing of the indigenous people continued into the 1920's.
I remember that movie having seen it years ago. For my first 6 years in China, besides teaching English I also taught Australian Law, and what shocked me is that they still have discriminatory real estate laws that put the aboriginals at a disadvantage - do not give them equal rights with others.
Buzz in Australlia to this day, indigenous are not equal to whites in any way shape or form. That's a sad fact.
It is uploaded to the video section Sweets and is telling me that it is currently being processed, will update when it is available....
Yes, I understood that from the beginning.
The abuse I was, also, talking about was government sanctioned, but my grandmother saw through that and married a man she did not love.
Her children would have been subjected to abuse beyond belief. The holier than thou beast subjecting them to their young lives being destroyed.
Perrie, imagine what it was like back then.
It has taken me a couple of days to be able to face reading this article. I feel so badly about it all! What horrible, despicable, unholy things that were done to these children! AND their parents. AND their tribes and nations.
I'm so sorry. I'll help where I can... So sad!
Hopefully someday the government and the organizations that ran these ''schools'' will be held accountable.
As much as I hope so, I doubt they ever will. Being my most cynical... But accountability is not the name of the game today.
Rabbit-Proof Fence 2002 Miramax Entertainment
A very powerful movie....
You can view it better from HERE
Excellent, thanks NWM.
My pleasure Brother....
Perfect viewing even for where I am. No buffering or stuttering. I had forgotten the plot, and now see that the indigenous children, or perhaps it was only the half caste ones, were treated no differently than the native children were treated in North America. At least Canada has apologized, and I believe paid at least some reparations, but I don't know what the USA has done.
The U.S. has done nothing at all except avoid taking any responsibility for this.