Studying the Past & First Peoples
Someone who studies the past using written records, oral traditions, and artifacts.
What is a historian (or archaeologist)?
European traders traveled to Minnesota primarily to acquire the pelts of this flat-tailed animal to make stylish hats.
What is the beaver?
In this year, Minnesota officially became the 32nd state of the United States.
What is 1858?
In the summer of 1862, extreme tension over late treaty payments and starvation led to this tragic six-week war in Minnesota.
What is the U.S.-Dakota War?
During their seasonal hunts on the prairie, the Dakota lived in these highly portable, cone-shaped shelters made from wooden poles and buffalo hides.
What are tipis?
This Native American group has lived in Minnesota the longest and calls the meeting of the Minnesota and Mississippi rivers "Bdote".
Who are the Dakota?
A written agreement between two or more nations, such as the ones signed between the U.S. government and Native tribes.
What is a treaty?
Before it officially became a state in 1858, the U.S. government organized Minnesota as this type of region in 1849.
What is a territory?
During the bitter winter of 1862–1863, hundreds of Dakota elders, women, and children were held in an internment camp at this specific Minnesota landmark.
What is Fort Snelling?
The name "Dakota" translates to this word, which reflects the strong alliances between their different bands.
What is "friend" (or "ally")?
A diary, photograph, or letter created by someone who lived through a historical event is known as this type of evidence.
What is a primary source?
These workers, often French-Canadian, did the heavy lifting of paddling canoes and carrying large bundles of furs across portages.
Who are the voyageurs?
Minnesota officially became the 32nd state to join the United States on May 11 of this year.
What is 1858?
Following the U.S.-Dakota War, 38 Dakota men were executed by hanging in this southern Minnesota city on December 26, 1862.
What is Mankato?
This core idea—meaning deep, respectful connections with one's extended family and relatives—formed the foundation of traditional Dakota society.
What is kinship?
This Native American group migrated to Minnesota from the east coast, following a prophecy to find "the food that grows on water" wild rice.
Who are the Ojibwe (or Anishinaabe)?
Signed in 1851, this major treaty resulted in the Dakota ceding millions of acres of their land in southern Minnesota to the U.S. government.
What is the Treaty of Traverse des Sioux?
During the 1857 constitutional convention, delegates from these two rival political parties refused to sit in the same room, resulting in two separate copies of the state constitution being signed.
What are the Democrats and Republicans?
After the war, the U.S. government canceled all treaties and forced the Dakota into this permanent status outside the borders of Minnesota.
What is exile?
Traditional Dakota culture viewed time and history not as a straight line, but as this shape, reflecting the repetition of the seasons.
What is a circle?
The Dakota and Ojibwe passed down their history, culture, and lessons through this method of storytelling from generation to generation.
What is oral tradition?
The U.S. government wanted Native Americans to adopt European-American farming lifestyles.
What are assimilation?
He was a prominent fur trader, the territory's representative in Washington D.C., and was eventually elected as Minnesota's first state governor.
Who is Henry Sibley?
In 1863, the U.S. Congress punished the Dakota by officially abolishing all of these, effectively wiping out their land rights and previous agreements in Minnesota.
What are treaties?
In Dakota culture, the deeply respected value of ohanwaste refers to this specific act of giving without expecting anything in return.
What is generosity?