Past News Items

Award of two contracts for rehabilitation of dormitories at Cheyenne and Arapaho School, Concho, Oklahoma, and at Ft. Sill School, Ft. Sill, Oklahoma, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

Award of a $351,746 contract for construction of enlarged dormitory facilities to accommodate 58 additional Indian children at Huerfano, on the Navajo Indian Reservation, near Bloomfield, New Mexico, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The successful bidder is Anchor Construction Company, Roswell, New Mexico. Eight higher bids ranging from $356,590 to $473,400 were submitted by contractors from New Mexico and Illinois.

Promotion of Don Y. Jensen to superintendent of the Indian Bureau's Northern Cheyenne Agency, Lame Deer, Montana, effective September 8, was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

Mr. Jensen has been for the past year land operations officer at the Bureau's Standing Rock Agency, Fort Yates, N. Dak. Previously he served for one year at Blackfeet Agency, Browning, Montana, and eight years at the Crow Agency in Montana as a soil conservationist and land-use planner. He was born at Castle Dale, Utah, in 1920 and is a graduate of Utah State College.

Contracts totaling $519,000 have been signed by the Bureau of Indian Affairs with 15 States to provide agricultural extension services this fiscal year, the Department of the Interior announced today. The services are for Indian ranch and farm families on reservations.

The contracts were signed under authority of the Johnson-O’Malley Act of 1934, as amended in 1936. This law authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to contract with and pay States and political subdivisions for the provision of services such as education and agricultural extension to Indian people.

Reflecting the increasing Indian Bureau emphasis on encouraging the growth of industry around Indian reservations, Acting Secretary of the Interior Hatfield Chilson today announced the appointment of Noel Sargent, a longtime principal staff member of the National Association of Manufacturers, as consultant on the Bureau’s industrial development program and creation of a new branch of industrial development in the Bureau’s Washington office.

Acting Secretary of the Interior Hatfield Chilson today announced the signing of a 25-year contract with Colorado River Enterprises, Inc., Phoenix, Arizona, under which the corporation will complete the gravity irrigation system on the Colorado River Indian Reservation in western Arizona and develop approximately 67,000 acres of agricultural land at an estimated cost of $28,000,000.

During the last five years of the contract one-fifth of the developed land will be turned over each year for use by the Indians who are the beneficial owners of the property.

Assistant Secretary of the Interior Roger Ernst today urged congressional enactment of legislation to authorize extension of the irrigation distribution system of the Coachella Valley County Water District of Riverside County, California, to about 10,000 acres of Indian land on the Augustine, Cabazon and Torres-Martinez Reservations.

Award of contracts for architectural and engineering services on three proposed school enlargement projects to accommodate 1,187 additional children on the Navajo Indian Reservation in Arizona and New Mexico was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The largest of the three jobs involves an expansion of the Indian school at Leupp, Ariz., from its present capacity of 67 students to 697. The $60,000 architectural-engineering contract on this was awarded to Scholer and Fuller, Associate Architects, Tucson, Ariz.

Regulations to govern the leasing of unassigned land on the Colorado River Indian Reservation in western Arizona until August 14, 1957, were announced today by Secretary of the Interior Douglas McKay.

Dear Sir or Madam:

In view of the special concern of all persons interested in Indian affairs in the extension of the Indian Claims Commission Act, I am attaching a copy of the Department's most recent report on this important legislation.

Sincerely yours,

June 25, 1956

My dear Senator Murray: