Iowa State University Capstones, Theses and Graduate Theses and Dissertations Dissertations 2020 Forces of nature: An environmental history of Inkpaduta's 1857 attack on Spirit Lake Kevin Timothy Mason Iowa State University Follow this and additional works at: https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/etd Recommended Citation Mason, Kevin Timothy, "Forces of nature: An environmental history of Inkpaduta's 1857 attack on Spirit Lake" (2020). Graduate Theses and Dissertations. 17929. https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/etd/17929 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Iowa State University Capstones, Theses and Dissertations at Iowa State University Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Graduate Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Iowa State University Digital Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Forces of nature: An environmental history of Inkpaduta’s 1857 attack on Spirit Lake by Kevin Timothy Mason A dissertation submitted to the graduate faculty in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Major: Rural, Agricultural, Technological, and Environmental History Program of Study Committee: Pamela Riney-Kehrberg, Major Professor Sebastian Braun Julie Courtwright Kathleen Hilliard Christopher Low The student author, whose presentation of the scholarship herein was approved by the program of study committee, is solely responsible for the content of this dissertation. The Graduate College will ensure this dissertation is globally accessible and will not permit alterations after a degree is conferred. Iowa State University Ames, Iowa 2020 Copyright © Kevin T. Mason, 2020. All rights reserved. ii DEDICATION To Marissa, Rocky, and Arthur iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS………………………………………………………………………iv ABSTRACT……………………………………………………………………………………..vii CHAPTER ONE: “A PIONEER’S PROMISED LAND”………………………………………...1 CHAPTER TWO: “AN ENCHANTED WORLD”……………………………………………...32 CHAPTER THREE: “THEY ARE MOSTLY A DIRTY, THIEVING RACE”………………...90 CHAPTER FOUR: “UNTIL THE LAST BAND SHOULD BECOME EXTINCT”………….149 CHAPTER FIVE: “THE REVENGE OF THE INDIANS WAS SATISFIED”……………….208 CHAPTER SIX: “THE FAR-FAMED PRAIRIES OF IOWA”……………………………….270 REFERENCES…………………………………………………………………………………300 iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS While I was growing up my dad would often say, “If you’re going to be a ditch digger, be the best damn ditch digger you can be.” I may not be the best historian I can be yet, but thanks to the people and institutions that have nurtured me I hope to be my best one day. Writing a dissertation is the final ascent in a climb that starts years before, and I have been incredibly fortunate to have exceptional company along the way. The completion of this project was only possible because of the people and institutions that supported me during this journey. Iowa State University granted me the opportunity to obsessively research a topic close to my heart while also working full-time. Throughout the entirety of my doctoral work, I found a home away from home in Ames while making the hundred mile or so trek several times a week. I am grateful to my committee of Pamela Riney-Kehrberg, Sebastian Braun, Julie Courtwright, Kathleen Hilliard, and Christopher Low for allowing to me to examine a subject that has always intrigued me. The professors and students in the Iowa State history program helped to develop this project through thoughtful feedback, passionate discussion, and commiserative support. I also owe a significant debt of gratitude to the good folks at Waldorf University. Within the ivy ensconced walls of Salveson Hall I have found fertile soil for personal growth. David Behling, Paul Bartelt, Larry Hill, Eric Franco, Scott Pitcher, and James Scarry all nudged me toward making the decision to pursue this opportunity. Bob Alsop, Vincent Beach, Cindy Carter, Tony Wical, Jonathan Klauke, Steve Smith, David Greder, and a host of other faculty and staff members have been instrumental in helping me to navigate this challenge successfully. I am most grateful to my students over the past six years. They have inspired me to improve myself, provided meaningful distraction, and thoughtfully listened to ideas as they were in development. v I’m also just thankful that Waldorf was willing to take a chance on an unproven historian, provided me with the tools to better myself, and empowered me every step of the way. I dreamed of becoming a historian long before I arrived at Iowa State, and I appreciate all of the people that enabled my dream. During my youngest years of education in the Mason City and Pella Community school districts I was blessed with many great teachers who helped to set me in the right direction. Mark Core, Tracy Skogen, David Ross, Jackie Harvey, Mike Vint, Ann Visser, and Kathy Van Norden patiently taught me what it meant to truly care about others in an educational setting. At North Iowa Area Community College Jeffrey Pilz, Kris Meyer, Jayson Ryner, Mark Mohl and Pete Peterson helped me find my path. In the Missouri River Valley at the University of Mary and the Fort Abraham Lincoln Foundation I learned from Randall Herbst, Joseph Stewart, Mark Springer, Matt Schanandore, Jeff Carlson, and Robert Hanna a lot about how to love what you do and use that love to do it well. I am beholden to many other friends, peers, colleagues, and acquaintances in ways large and small. I would have never undertaken or completed this journey without the help of so many. My final debt of gratitude goes to my family. My parents, Dan and Kay, patiently provided for and supported me in ways that I continue to understand better all the time. Tyler has always proved an easygoing counterweight and constant source of calm for my stormy spirit. Alison has always pushed me to be my best, and provided encouragement consistently throughout this journey. My maternal grandparents, Rodney and Maurine, provided me an encouraging place to ask questions and read books during my first years of exploring this world. Darwin and Shirley, my paternal grandparents, inspired me through their hard work and consistent love. Tim and Beth, Karin and Tim, Kirsten, Barb and Gene, and all of the rest of my extended family have shown me what it means to be loved. Bob, as well as Sandy and Craig, vi Derrick, and Brian have all taught me that family can be something that finds you. Paula and Robbie, Jon Bendickson, Andrew Lopez, Dustin Tuttle, Remi Bakker, Kalvin Stern, Riley Cooper, Wyatt Goodrich, Chris MacDonald, John Bramlett, Jordan Wilhelm, and too many other people to mention showed me that family can be something you choose. A little girl named Corinne taught me to always believe in the better tomorrow we can create together. And finally, to my wife Marissa, you’re still the best thing that ever happened to me. Thank you. vii ABSTRACT The world in which Inkpaduta grew up in the northern Iowa borderlands rapidly changed during the nineteenth century. As Americans entered Dakota occupied lands, alterations to the environment undercut the ability of the Wahpekute to continue vital sustenance patterns. Decimation of animal species, destruction of plant resources, and the introduction of diseases resulted as eager Americans plowed under the tall-grass prairies. Inkpaduta sought to maintain sovereignty and autonomy for the Wahpekute bands living in Iowa as American encroachment underwrote acculturative efforts. Through quantification of acres surveyed, acres improved, acres unimproved, shifting animal populations, and dendrochronological research a clear picture emerges of the pressures building around Inkpaduta prior to the attack on Spirit Lake. That data, when paired with qualification from Dakota sources and the records of the developing American communities, creates a nuanced account of how the Wahpekute sought to maintain sovereignty and autonomy in the face of American acculturation 1 CHAPTER ONE: “A PIONEER’S PROMISED LAND” A small band of Wahpekute Dakota arrived at the cabin of Rowland Gardner on March 8, 1857, and they made demands for flour and other provisions. Rowland Gardner turned to gather some supplies, and with his back turned, he sustained a shot through the heart. The echo from the shot rolled out of the cabin and across the prairie, alerting more settlers to an intensifying danger. Over the course of the next few days, the band of Wahpekute Dakota led by Inkpaduta attacked scattered settlements throughout the northern Iowa borderlands leaving behind thirty- nine slain settlers.1 The Wahpekute took Abbie Gardner-Sharp, as well as three other women, captive. Area settlers formed a volunteer regiment from Fort Dodge, Iowa, and a military regiment from Fort Ridgley, Minnesota responded to the attack. Both proved unsuccessful in freeing the captives or exacting revenge on Inkpaduta and his band. Over the course of the months that followed the governor of Minnesota worked to ransom and return to freedom Gardner-Sharp and Margaret Ann Marble, a fate far better than the other two women initially held captive who died as the Dakota fled west beyond the reach of American justice. The event marked the final conflict between the emergent American population and the indigenous inhabitants of the newly created state of Iowa. In the aftermath of the 1857 violence at Spirit Lake, the Wahpekute Dakota have largely disappeared from Iowa. The southernmost bands of the Dakota lived in the state from at least the earliest recordings of Europeans.2 Public memory and the historiographies of Iowa have erased and obscured signs of the Dakota presence. A minimized Dakota existence within the state, weaponized doctrines of effective occupation that obliterated land claims, and manipulated 1 Chas. E. Flandreau, “Official Account,” April 11, 1957, SED no. 23, 35th Congress, 1st Session, Series 919. 2 Gwen Westerman and Bruce White, Min Sota Makoce: The Land of the Dakota. (St. Paul, MN: Minnesota Historical Society, 2012), 17. 2 evidence have obscured the historical record.