Past News Items

Indian income from minerals other than oil and gas seems headed for a record high total in the fiscal year which ends June 30, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Glenn L. Emmons said today in an informal report to Secretary of the Interior Fred A. Seaton.

THE AMERICAN INDIAN TODAY

Because of the warmly sympathetic interest which your National Society has taken in the welfare of our Indian citizens over a period of many years, I consider it a real privilege and an honor that you have invited me to speak to you here today on my favorite subject.

Award of a $40,900 contract for construction of 20 deep-pit-type circular charcos (earthen stock water tanks) in the Sells and Gu Achi Districts of the Papago Indian Reservation in southern Arizona to L. P. McCrite & Son, Gilbert, Arizona, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The McCrite bid was the lowest of 18 bids received. The others ranged from $41,600 to $193,700.

Award of a $96,262 contract for remodeling the Bullhead Day School on the Standing Rock Indian Reservation approximately 16 miles west of McLaughlin, South Dakota, to Sogge Construction Company, Sioux Falls, South Dakota, was announced by the Department of the Interior today.

The Sogge bid was the lowest of seven received. Other bids for the work ranged from $99,790 to $129,400.

Award of a $64,322.48 contract for construction of 2.508 miles of bituminous paved highway on the Fort Yuma Indian Reservation, Imperial County, California, to Basich Brothers Construction Company and N. L. Basich, South San Gabriel, California, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The Basichs were the low bidder. Seven other bids were received, ranging from $78,322.48 to $116,857.20.

Secretary of the Interior Fred A. Seaton called attention today to the publication of a proposed membership roll of the Wyandotte Indian Tribe of Oklahoma which appeared in the Federal Register of April 6.

The roll was prepared by the tribe under terms of a 1956 congressional law which provides for termination of Federal supervision over the property of the tribe by 1958.

Competitive bidding for oil and gas leases on Indian lands in the "four corners" area of New Mexico, Arizona, Utah and Colorado has resulted in bonuses for the Indian owners totaling over $45,000,000 in the past six months, the Secretary of the Interior Fred A. Seaton announced today.

By comparison, the combined income realized by all Indian tribal groups and individual Indian landowners from bonuses, rents and royalties on oil and gas leases in the l2-month period which ended last June 30 was approximately $41,000,000.

Sproul Construction Company, Albuquerque, N. Mex., has been awarded a $780,500 contract for a major expansion and renovation of the Indian Bureau's boarding school plant at Lukachukai, Ariz., on the Navajo Reservation, the Department of the Interior announced today.

Sproul's bid was the lowest of 11 received. The others ranged from $810,188 to $972,000.

Designation of new Indian Bureau superintendents at the Fort Belknap Agency, Harlem, Mont., and the Uintah and Ouray Agency, Fort Duchesne, Utah, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

Darrell Fleming, who has been superintendent at Fort Belknap for nearly five years, will take over the Utah post April 13 replacing John O. Crow who transferred to the Bureau’s Washington office as a program officer March 24. At Fort Belknap Mr. Fleming will be succeeded April 5, by Howard Dushane who has been program officer in the area office at Portland, Oreg., since 1955.

A contract to supply 10,000 feet of corrugated metal culver pipe for use in water spreading and drought alleviation work on the Papago Indian Reservation of southern Arizona has been awarded to the

Consolidated Western Steel Division of the United States Steel Corporation in Phoenix, the Department of the Interior announced today. Consolidated Western Steel's bid of $28,485.60 for supplying the 18- and 24- inch pipe was the lowest of four received by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. The others ranged from $30,781.80 to $34,917.60.