The Otoe-Missouria are a Native American tribe whose tribal headquarters is located at Red Rock, Oklahoma in Noble County. The examples utilized in this section are not intended to tell the whole story of the Otoe-Missouria people, but to provide an illustration of their culture, society, leisure activities, economics and lifestyles.
This study was funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, Oklahoma Humanities Council, and the Cherokee Strip Historical Society. In-kind donations to the project were made by the Oklahoma Historical Society, The Cherokee Strip Museum, Perry Public Schools, Charles Machine Works, the Exchange Bank and Trust and various local individuals.
Note: Not all of the historical information and photographs contained in this exhibit are available at the Cherokee Strip Museum. Photographs may have been edited for presentation on the web site.
Who are They?
“The Otoe and Missouria, along with the Iowa (q.v.), are part of the Chiwere group of the Siouan linguistic family.” (Wright, p. 199) By the 18th century the Otoe resided near the Platte River in present day Nebraska and the Missouria lived on the Grand River in what is now Missouri. By 1817, the Missouria numbered little more than one hundred people and united with the Otoe in the interest of peace and survival. Since that union, the Otoe-Missouria has been recognized as one people by other tribes and the federal government. The Tribe’s own social organization acknowledges a more distinct separation. (Otoe-Missouria Tribe, pp. 11-12)
History
In the 1800’s the Otoe-Missouria lived on the prairies and made their homes along the Platte and Grand Rivers. “They hunted bison and grew corn, squash, and beans in the river valleys. Patrilineally related families lived in large earthen lodges in permanent villages and, when hunting the bison, occupied tipis in smaller family groups. Both men and women cultivated the gardens, but the greatest share of the horticultural work fell to the women. Men were hunters, but women cut and dried the bison meat, distributed it, and prepared the hides.
“Men owned their personal possessions, such as clothes and hunting gear. Women owned the tipis, and all the things associated with them, as well as the produce from the garden.” (Schweitzer, pp. 60-61)
“In 1804, Lewis and Clark visited the Otoe, paving the way for the flood of Americans. With them came a peculiar and lasting relationship between the Otoe-Missouria and the American government.” (Otoe-Missouria Tribe, p.11)
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Map 2 – The Otoes and Missourias before 1854 held their lands by Indian title. In that year they received land on the Big Blue River by treaty title. Because of pressure from white settlers, between 1830 and 1881 the Otoes and Missourias were convinced to give up more and more of their land to the U.S. government. With each treaty, their reservation got smaller.
In this location, along Red Rock Creek in what is now Noble County, Oklahoma, the tribe came into closer contact with various other Native Americans removed to reservations in Indian Territory.
Within this geographic region, the various tribes were different in many ways. Each tribe had its own particular customs, clothing, and way of living life every day. Moreover, as Indian Territory was opened up to settlement, Native Americans had to learn to live with European Americans, African Americans, and others who came to Oklahoma to find a new home. This dynamic process continues with new people arriving from Asia, Latin America, and other places.
From Where?
“This story of the confederated tribe of Otoe and Missouria began centuries ago when a mass of people located near the Great Lakes, withdrew from their parent stock and departed on a quest of their own.” (Otoe-Missouria Tribe, p.11)
During the 19th Century, pressure from the Federal government caused the Otoe-Missouria to move and give up more and more of their land. The dominant white culture felt that farming was the proper use for the prairie lands.
Movements
The Otoes and Missourias once owned land in Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska (map #1). In about 1800, the Otoes and Missourias lived in Nebraska between the Great Nemaha River and the Platt River. In 1816, Auguste Chouteau prepared “Notes” about where certain tribes lived (map #3).
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The Otoes and Missourias before 1854 held their lands by Indian title. In that year they received land on the Big Blue River by treaty title. Because of pressure from white settlers, between 1830 and 1881 the Otoes and Missourias were convinced to give up more and more of their land to the U.S. government (map #2). With each treaty, their reservation got smaller.
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Wave after wave of white men settled all around the Otoe reserve on the Big Blue River. Dr. Grant Foreman said that the white people, “made the lives of the Indians so wretched that they were anxious to escape to the Indian Territory.” (Foreman, 19??). The Otoes and Missourias gradually came to the conclusion that it was best for them to remove from their reservation in Nebraska and Kansas to Indian Territory.
In 1881, the Otoes and Missourias in Nebraska and Kansas sold what was left of their reservation and moved to Indian Territory. The new reservation on Red Rock Creek (in current day Noble County, Oklahoma – maps ok1889, and ok1900) had been chosen by a delegation from the tribe and purchased with tribal funds.
Beliefs
The Otoe-Missouria struggled with maintaining their traditional way of life and adapting to the new non-Indian culture. Historical circumstances forced change on the Otoe-Missouria. “By incorporating many of these changes into their lives and interweaving them with old ways, the Otoes have maintained continuity in social relationships and a worldview that continues to distinguish them from other people. The result is a strong and continued sense of Otoe identity, albeit an identity blended with attributes of the dominant society. Basic to maintaining an Otoe consciousness is their ability to adapt.” (Schweitzer, p.159)
The Otoe-Missouria struggled with maintaining their traditional way of life and adapting to the new non-Indian culture. Historical circumstances forced change on the Otoe-Missouria. “By incorporating many of these changes into their lives and interweaving them with old ways, the Otoes have maintained continuity in social relationships and a worldview that continues to distinguish them from other people. The result is a strong and continued sense of Otoe identity, albeit an identity blended with attributes of the dominant society. Basic to maintaining an Otoe consciousness is their ability to adapt.” (Schweitzer, p.159)
Insasmuch as family ties were fundamentally important, many members of a family helped to care for the Otoe children. Grandparents, aunts, and uncles all shared responsibility with a child’s parents for the proper upbringing of an Otoe boy or girl. Especially important was the relationship between an Otoe boy and his mother’s brother, because the uncle gave the boy a nickname and was expected to offer advice upon important matters.
Stories
The Birth of the People
Nothing existed at the beginning, except an abundance of water. It flowed everywhere, eventually pushing all life out of it. In time, the water receded, and land surfaced. Vegetation spouted. Forests reached towering heights. In the recesses of these forests, animals and birds dwelt. All life spoke the same language.
From the life-giving waters, the Bear Clan rose and came ashore. They peered about the dry world and thought that they were the first people here. But they were quickly disappointed when they came upon the tracks of others which were embedded in the soft mud, leading out and away from the water. Following these signs, the Bear Clan chased the Beaver Clan, whom they eventually caught. The Beaver Clan, a diplomatic people, suggested that the clans become brothers and live together in harmony, because alone life was so hard. The intent of the Bear Clan was to kill the Beaver Clan when they found them, but the Bears were soon pacified by their new kin and resigned themselves to the fact that they were not the first people. So, the Bear and Beaver Clans kept each other company and were companions at the Beginning. Some time passed before the Bear and Beaver Clans met other peoples and the two were content to think no others existed. Then it happened. The Bear and Beaver Clans came upon the Elks, whom they desired to kill. But instead, the Elks proposed that they be allowed to accompany the two clans. After a time, the Bear and Beaver Clans had a change of heart and agreed that all could be brothers and help one another.
Now the sky people came through the sky opening and swooped down to earth, where they found evidence of three other clans. The Eagles knew that there were more people in the other three clans than in the Eagles. The Eagles approached these clans and once more the clans grew. Having decided to live together, they began sharing among themselves certain things and knowledge that had before belonged solely to the individual clans, but it was now used to help all the clans.
In order to learn how to live, the clans called upon Waconda, the Creator. Waconda taught each clan certain things and gave each group certain scared knowledge, and therefore, rights associated with a sacred pipe that also was a gift from Waconda. In this manner (of the sacred pipe) the four clans lived.
In time the Bear, Beaver, Elk and Eagle Clans met the Buffalo(head), Snake, Owl and Pigeon Clans. The last two, like the Eagles, were from the sky. The Buffalohead, renamed Buffalo, Owl, Pigeon and Snake (now extinct) had their own pipe, and this sacred possession they offered to the Bear, Beaver, Elk and Eagle Clans. At first, this gesture was ignored by the Bears and the pipe rejected. But the Bears softened and finally Bear, Beaver, Elk and Eagle Clans accepted the pipe which was an offering of friendship and co-existence. They reciprocated, making a similar gesture of friendship. So it was in these acts that everything began… (Otoe-Missouria Tribe, pp. 26-27).
Truman Daily
Truman Daily: “We don’t have a lot of the old ceremonies anymore. The ceremonies were alive when the people practiced them. But when the civilized environment came over, it began to die. Now they are faded away; it’s all gone. But we are singing songs today that were composed by people who are now gone. Their life ceased to exist on this earth. They composed the song. Well, we can’t bury the song. The only way is forget about it in our mind. But then that song was so meaningful that we still sing it.” (Otoe-Missouria Tribe, p. 30).
Truman Dailey: “Then there was my uncle Charley. He could carve things out of wood, and he could paint pictures. But he couldn’t sell his pictures. So, he kind of had a difficult time. And then he was married, and his wife was going to have a baby, but before his boy was born there was something shameful took place. His mother-in-law hit him. That’s a no-no. He loved his wife and all like that, but when that happened that was the same as saying, ‘Get out of here. We don’t want you.’ So, he left them. In the meantime, one of his ‘brothers’ that is, one of his cousins, had married this white woman. Her name was Dora. She was white, but she was raised by the Otoes. She had three children with that man, but then he died.
So, after a while the folks got my uncle Charley and this white woman together. That was the system, because Charley was a “brother” to that man. And Charley was just like their own father to them children. He wasn’t no stepfather, cause their own father and Charley, they were first cousins — they were ‘brothers.’ That’s the way the Indians look at it. So, Charley, he lived with her about forty, fifty years, until she died. And then he married again, but in his old age. (Stanley, pp. 129-30).
Education
“Traditionally Otoe children watched, listened to, and imitated adults to learn the skills they needed to survive. They were expected to be keen observers of their world around them. Stories and legends told around the winter hearth by grandparents explained in easy-to-understand images the basis of Otoe beliefs, the origins of the clans, how to respect the animals, and how to treat other around them.” (Schweitzer, p. 62)
Learning was different in the government schools and in rural one-room schools. There is much documentation of the questionable aspect of the boarding school experiences–suppression of native languages; regimentation in dress, hairstyle, and behavior; inadequate and narrow academic training; insensitive teachers and corporal punishment. However, attending the Otoe School or a traditional one-room school was not necessarily a negative experience.
“Quakers originally established the Otoe-Missouria Boarding School on the Big Blue reservation. When the tribe removed to Oklahoma the teachers and school equipment accompanied them. At Red Rock a new frame school building was erected and by 1882 classes again were in session. The school’s curriculum reflected a mixture of white social and academic standards. In addition to such basics as reading, writing, and arithmetic, Otoe-Missouria students learned a variety of vocational subjects. Boys were taught carpentry or agriculture while their sisters learned how to cook, sew, or clean house. The students also were indoctrinated with white cultural values. The Indian children were often taught that everything Indian was undesirable. The students were urged to exchange their tribal ways for those of the white man. Many students received their secondary education at Indian boarding schools such as Haskell Institute in Lawrence, Kansas.
Ironically, the school’s success in introducing white values among the tribe eventually contributed to the institution’s closure. By 1918, many Otoe-Missouria parents preferred to send their children to public schools in neighboring white communities and the school closed. The buildings later were used as part of the Otoe-Missouria Tribal Center.
Stories
Grace Kiheaga
“Grandpa White Horse…. was a great doctor in Otoe. My grandma (Sallie Whitehorse) was a great woman. She too, was a real Indian doctor. She worked with grandpa. He cured many of his people in the Indian way…. I follow them, but I don’t go in when grandpa is doctoring. I keep out. But my grandma works with him. If it’s a woman, my grandma doctor the lady. A woman gets sick, grandma takes care of her. Then my grandpa, he takes care of the man if he sick, but my grandma still works with him. They both work together…” (Otoe-Missouria Tribe, p. 37)
Truman Daily
“In older times, there were four categories’ boys might strive to achieve. The highest rank was to be a leader. He could be a leader for his people. If he couldn’t do this, then the second rank would be a warrior. Protect the village. Get him to sacrifice his life for the people. Now, if the boy couldn’t make any one of these, the next he could be a hunter. He could provide food for the village as well as himself. The next one he might do was to study medicine, or to become an apprentice by attaching himself to an old man who had this knowledge. It took him ten to fifteen years. The medicine people are in charge of the health of the tribe. There are also some medicine women.” (Otoe-Missouria Tribe, p. 30)
John Childs
“I went to school over here… I would say that I was about seven or eight and there were about eight kids that went to school here, who lived in the dorm. All government schools are strick with the children. Lots of them used to run away. They would say, ‘Let’s run away and go on home.’ School just went half a day. The rest of the day, we did painting, carpentry or farming. We had cattle and grew our own food… At that time we had a watchman whose job was to walk around the school and so forth. If anybody ran away, well he went after them. We also had an interpreter.” (Otoe-Missouria Elder, p. 28)
Truman Daily
“My parents told me to go to school. What my parents said, I followed it. My grandma said, ‘You must always try to be an Indian, in your heart and thinking, although you are going to live like a white man.’” (Otoe-Missouria Elders, p. 33)
Daily Life
Dramatic changes in the lifestyle of the tribe occurred as the tribe was forced to cede more of their lands to open the way for westward expansion. On the reservations in Nebraska and in Indian Territory, growing numbers of tribal members adopted white farming methods. The Otoe-Missouria tended individual fields, planting crops of wheat corn, oats, and potatoes. In a continuation of their traditional roles, women cared for the homes and were often responsible for the farming. Fences enclosed many of the farms and some of the farm families lived in substantial farmhouses surrounded by numerous outbuildings and carefully nurtured orchards. While the Otoe-Missouria viewed the land as communally owned, allotment eventually forced the tribal members into individual ownership of the land.
Stories
Truman Daily
“When my father and mother got married and they got started, he was kind of a policeman. They had range riders. The north, west, and south boundaries of the reservation, there was an Otoe would ride that line every day. Dad got that job on the west line over there, riding it north and south. This was before allotment, and they could live wherever they wanted to on the reservation, so to be close, Grandma said best to move over there. So, they built a cellar over there near the west line. And course Dad’s ‘brother’ Burgess was handy — he learned carpentry at Hampton — so they bought lumber, and they built kind of a three-room shack over there.
“Every day my father rode the line. We was just about three-eighths mile from the line.
He’d go north one day and back, next day he’d go south and back. Then when they had allotment they chose theirs over there, and when they built them government houses, they got one of those. They built on my father’s place, on his allotment. And by that time my grandmother (a member of the Iowa tribe) had my father to start farming. Several years, they added on to that house — both sides. When I was born and began to remember, we had a big house. Five rooms on the main floor and three rooms at the top. Had a big barn. Big fields of corn. Big orchard. “And my grandmother knew about orchards, and when they built the house my grandmother told my mother to tell my father to establish a yard and plant an orchard. On the east side the yard run about a eighth of a mile or a little longer. And then on the south, it was about the width of an acre and a half. And then on the west side and on the north-again.
Dad plowed a furrow around all four sides, made it straight. And he planted walnuts a-l-l around the outer circle of the yard. So when I was born and remember, them tree, to me they was tall, and every fall we’d have a g-r-e-a-t big pile of walnuts. And then inside was our orchard. We had apples, pears, peaches, plums and cherries. That’s all I know about the orchard. And then later on, when that land was settled and them homesteaders come in there, it was their style to put out a vineyard. They’d make wine. So after they began to get acquainted with them, I guess Mother and Grandma would go out there and see that, and so then we had a vineyard. Four rows, maybe a hundred yards long. We didn’t make wine, but there was grape jelly, grape jam, fruit in season.
My grandmother was the instigator of all that…” (Stanley, p. 152-154)
Lizzie (Dailey) Harper:
“My Indian name is translated to ‘Standing on the Earth’… I was born north of the agency here… We practically always had white people with us because my father always had hired hands of different nationalities. Mother was busy housekeeping and she had to cook for and take care of the hired hands. My father was hardly home because he was the captain of police and all his time was at the agency. So mother and grandmother had to carry on the homework and I was just a little girl…” (Otoe-Missouria Tribe, p. 34)
“A woman from the Blackfeet, Miss Clarke, she’s the one who came and surveyed this reservation. And a lot of our old people, if they see the rocks, cornerstones, the four rocks marking the lines, well, they take them and throw them away. They didn’t want that. But the law come and told the old people to take those rocks and put them where the cornerstones were supposed to be. So that was it. Allotment one and ten years later, Allotment two.” (Otoe-Missouria Elders, p.35)
Other Photos
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission. 
This photograph is the property of Cherokee Strip Museum and should not be copied, used for publication or for other purposes without express permission.
Resources
Definitions
Allotment: the act, by the U.S. Government, of assigning specific land ownership to individual Native Americans.
Patrilineal: patrilineal societies trace their decent through the paternal (father’s) line.
Removal: the forced movement, by the U.S. Government, of Native Americans to a new location.
Turbulent Years: Prior to the tribe’s removal to Indian Territory, the tribe was divided by differences of opinion. Those Otoe-Missourias who had begun to adopt white ways and follow the leadership of the half-breeds and the Quaker Indian Agents were known as the “Quaker Band.” The Otoe-Missourias who wished to continue in the old ways of their fathers were called the “Coyote Band.”
The Coyote Band moved to Indian Territory first (1878), settling along the Cimarron River where the game was plentiful, and they could continue their traditional lifestyle. The Quaker Band moved in 1881 to the tribe’s current location along Red Rock Creek, where farmland was considered better. Although the bands differed in opinion, family ties among the Otoe-Missouria remained strong. By the end of the 1880’s, most Coyote Band members had joined the main band on the reservation.
Selected Bibliography
Beers, Fred G. (1991). The First Generation. A Half Century of Pioneering in Perry, Oklahoma. The Chares Machine Works.
Brown, Kenny L., Ph.D. (1993). “Culture, Society, and Leisure in the Cherokee Outlet.” The Chronicles of Oklahoma. Volume LXXI, Number 2.
Census Reports, Volume 1. Twelfth Census, 1900. Population, Part 1. United State Bureau of the Census.
Chapman, Berlin Basil Ph.D. (1965). The Otoes and Missourias. A Study of Indian Removal and the Legal Aftermath. Times Journal Publishing Co.
__________ (1966) “The Barnes Family of Barneston” Nebraska History. Volume XLVII, Number 1. (article about family that was in the “Quaker Band”)
Otoe-Missouria Tribe. (1981) The Otoe-Missouria Elders: Centennial Memoirs, 1881-1981. Red Rock, OK: The Otoe-Missouria Tribe.
Mahnken, Norbert R. (1993). “Making a Living.” The Chronicles of Oklahoma. Volume LXXI, Number 2.
Schweitzer, Marjorie M. (1999) “Otoe-Missouria Grandmothers: Linking Past, Present, Future.” In American Indian Grandmothers: Traditions and Transitions, ed. Margorie M. Schweitzer, 159-79. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.
Stanley, Lori A. (1993) “The Indian Path of Life: A Life History of Truman Washington Dailey of the Otoe-Missouria Tribe.” Ph.D. diss., University of Missouri-Columbia.
Wright, Muriel H. (1986) A Guide to the Indian Tribes of Oklahoma. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.