Tag Archives: Flathead Reservation

Exceptional Patients

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Native American Children in California, circa 1900, courtesy Sacramento Bee

Youth was no protection when it came to the possibility of commitment to an insane asylum. Dr. Harry Hummer admitted a six-year-old Caddo child named Amelia Moss to the Canton Asylum for Insane Indians in May or early June of 1922. His original correspondence to the reservation superintendent concerning the child is not available, but the superintendent’s reply makes it clear that Hummer was perfectly comfortable admitting her:

“I take pleasure in acknowledging receipt of your communication of May 8, 1922, advising that you are able to admit Amelia Moss, a full blood Caddo Indian child six years of age, to your institution, and that you are also ready to send your matron to this agency for the purpose of escorting this child to your institution.” (This letter, from superintendent J. A. Buntin(?), was written May 22, 1922.

According to Buntin’s letter, the Indians taking care of Moss (probably not her own parents) were anxious to send her to Hummer’s institution, “where she may be properly cared for.” Moss’s diagnosis was epilepsy, psychosis, and feeble-mindedness, though there is no reference to a psychiatrist’s confirming diagnosis of the mental issue. Most likely, Moss’s guardians didn’t want to care for her and thought she would be better off in an institution. Their attitude is certainly not Hummer’s fault, but accepting such a patient was definitely his own decision. It is difficult to believe that he actually thought a child so young could be insane, and even more difficult to believe that he thought he could actually help her.

Pueblo Tesuque Indian Children, circa 1880, courtesy Library of Congress

Indian Children, Flathead Reservation, 1907, courtesy Library of Congress

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How Does the Bureau of Indian Affairs Run?

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John Collier

John Collier’s article about Amerindians (see last post) laid the blame for much of the Indians’ misery on the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Indians were now full citizens of the United States, Collier wrote, but unlike all other citizens, were completely under the control of Congress through the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). The BIA controlled Indian property valued at $1,650,000,000, Indian income, and even their persons to a great extent.

The BIA could force Indian children to go to schools hundreds of miles away from home, “enforce an unpublished penal code” that allowed them to arrest Indians at will, censor Indians’ religious observances, and nullify an Indian’s last will and testament unless it had been previously approved by the BIA.

Worst of all, said Collier, the BIA “makes accounting to no agency juristic, legislative, and administrative.” It acted as a government unto itself and had a monopoly of control on reservations. He did note that the agency was finally having to account for itself through a survey being conducted at the time of his writing. This accounting resulted in the Meriam Report, discussed in posts on May 12-19.

Native American Farmer on Flathead Reservation , circa 1920, courtesy BIA

Sioux Men in Traditional Dress, 1909, courtesy Library of Congress

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The Problem of Indian Administration

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Health Care to Native Americans and Meriam Commission, courtesy National Institutes of Health

Health Care to Native Americans and Meriam Commission, courtesy National Institutes of Health

The Meriam Report (see last post) summed up its findings in the first chapter. The survey team found that the causes of then-current Indian conditions were so interrelated that they couldn’t be teased out from their effects. Instead, cause and effect formed a vicious circle of poverty and lack of adjustment. The team decided it was best to simply report on the conditions it found. The following are abbreviated examples:

1. Health. The health of the Indians as compared with that of the general population is bad.

2. Living Conditions. The prevailing living conditions among the great majority of the Indians are conducive to the development and spread of disease. With comparatively few exceptions the diet of the Indians is bad. It is generally insufficient in quantity, lacking in variety, and poorly prepared.

— The housing conditions are likewise conducive to bad health.

3. Economic Conditions. The income of the typical Indian family is low and the earned income extremely low.

4. The Causes of Poverty. The economic basis of the primitive culture of the Indians has been largely destroyed by the encroachment of white civilization.

The Meriam Report explained its findings in great detail, to the embarrassment of federal officials.

Teepee, Mescalero Reservation, 1936, courtesy Library of Congress

Teepee, Mescalero Reservation, 1936, courtesy Library of Congress

Typical Indian Home (Flathead Reservation, 1909), courtesy Library of Congress

Typical Indian Home (Flathead Reservation, 1909), courtesy Library of Congress

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Stuck Inside

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Few patients wanted to remain at the Canton Asylum for Insane Indians, and the staff (and sometimes townspeople) had to deal with a number of escapes. The April 28, 1905 edition of The Sioux Valley News, Canton’s weekly paper, mentioned that the superintendent of the asylum, O.S. Gifford, had “returned from the north and brought with him the runaway Indian who had escaped from the Indian asylum on Tuesday of last week.

“This is the same redskin who made his escape from the asylum several times before […] Judge Gifford said to a reporter for this paper on his return that it would be a warm day when the fellow would get the liberty enough to get away.” Unfortunately, the paper did not give the name of this determined patient.

Most escaped patients headed back to their reservations and families. The picture of Dirty John’s cabin represents the type of home they may have returned to.

Log Cabin Belonging to Dirty John, Flathead Reservation, 1909, courtesy Library of Congress

Log Cabin Belonging to Dirty John, Flathead Reservation, 1909, courtesy Library of Congress

The Badlands, S.D., courtesy Library of Congress

The Badlands, S.D., courtesy Library of Congress

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