Past News Items

The course of American Indian history was drastically changed, fifty years ago, by the passage of the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934, Interior Assistant Secretary Ken Smith told Indian leaders in a letter marking the act's fiftieth anniversary. Smith, a Wasco Indian from Oregon, is the Reagan Administration's top Indian official.

Smith noted that the act "marked a turning point in Federal-Indian relations. It halted or reversed prior policies which had cumulatively proved disastrous for Indians."

Completion of the final membership roll of the Wyandotte Indian Tribe of Oklahoma, following the disposition of all appeals, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The preliminary membership roll, published in the Federal Register April 5, 1957, included 1,159 individuals. The net result of additions and subtractions made as a consequence of appeals to the Secretary of the Interior is a final roll of 1,154 names.

The Crow Tribe of Montana, which received $11.6 million in federal and state contracts and earned $10.9 million from mineral and grazing leases and interest during fiscal years 1980 and 1981, was in a state of technical insolvency as of September 30, 1981, according to Department of the Interior Inspector General Richard Mulberry.

Appointment of Lloyd New Kiva, Cherokee Indian artist and owner-manager of an Indian arts and crafts shop at Scottsdale, Ariz., as a member of the Indian Arts and Crafts Board was announced today by Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall.

A native of Fairland, Okla., Kiva was named to fill out the unexpired term of Willard W. Beatty, who died September 29 shortly after being elected chairman of the Board. The term expires July 6, 1964.

Interior Assistant Secretary Ken Smith announced today that the Bureau of Indian Affairs' Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) at Santa Fe, New Mexico would be funded and would continue operations for at least the next two years.

Assignment of an Indian Bureau economic development officer to work with the Miccosukee Seminole Indians living along the Tamiami Trail in Florida on plans for improving their economic and social status was announced today by Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall.

The man chosen for the assignment is Reginald C. Miller, a veteran of 23 years' service with the Bureau, who recently completed a survey of the Miccosukees' situation and prospects at Secretary Udall's request.

Dr. Gerald E. Gipp, a 39-year-old member of the Standing Rock Sioux Indian tribe of North Dakota, has been named President of Haskell Indian Junior College.

Presently Deputy Assistant Secretary for Indian Education in the U.S. Department of Education in Washington, D.C., Gipp will assume his new duties upon the retirement of President Wallace Galluzzi in early January. He will be the first Indian ever to head the junior college.

Indian children in three Bureau of Indian Affairs schools will be given special education services and assistance next school year with the help of funding by the Office of Education.

Schools in which the programs will be initiated include Wahpeton Indian School, Wahpeton, N.D.; Phoenix Indian School in Phoenix, Ariz. and Intermountain School, Brigham City, Utah.

The three programs are intended to establish guidelines for Similar, future operations in other Bureau schools, where they are applicable.

Regulations governing the acquisitions of trust land for Indians published today (September 18) in the Federal Register. Commissioner of Indian Affairs William E, Hallett said today. The regulations are to be effective on October 18, 1980.

The Department of the Interior today announced the selection of Clyde W. Hobbs, superintendent of the Crow Indian Agency in Montana for the past four years, to head the Wind River Agency, Fort Washakie, Wyoming, effective June 4.

He succeeds Arthur N. Arnston who has been superintendent at Wind River since 1954 and is being assigned to complete the wind-up of Indian Bureau responsibilities on the Catawba Reservation in South Carolina as provided by a 1959 law.