OPA

With the filing deadline only two months away, the Bureau of Indian Affairs reported only 2,000 applications have been received from descendants of Miami Indians who believe they are eligible to share in more than $4 million in Indian Claims Commission awards to the tribe as additional payment for Ohio and Indiana land the Miami's sold the Government in 1818.

Virgil M. Harrington, BIA Area Director, Muskogee, Okla., said that he has issued 5,000 application forms and received only 2,000 back. All applications must be received at his office no later than July 31, 1967, he said.

Miami descendants are found in all parts of the Nation, Harrington said, with many living in the Midwest.

To be eligible for enrollment to share in the funds, Harrington said, a person must have been born on or prior to and living on Oct. 14, 1966 and be a direct lineal descendant of a person named on one of the rolls listed below: (Copies of the rolls are available upon request, he said,)

Roll of Miami Indians of Indiana of July 12, 1895.

Roll of "Miami Indians of Indiana, now living in Kansas, Quapaw Agency, Indian Territory, and Oklahoma Territory."

Roll of Eel River Miami Tribe of Indians of May 27, 1889, prepared and completed pursuant to the Act of June 29, 1888 (25 Stat.223).

Roll of Western Miami Tribe of Indians of June 12, 1891, prepared and completed pursuant to the Act of March 3, 1891 (26 Stat.1000)

Harrington said that part of the award, under Indian Claims Commission Docket l24A, totaling $64,700, less $3,400 in attorney's fees, will be paid to those who prove eligibility as an enrollee or descendant from a person listed on any of the rolls except the Roll of Western Miami Tribe of Indians June 12, 1891. Those on the current tribal roll of the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma are ineligible to share this portion of the award.

The rest of the award was paid in Claims Commission Docket 67 and 124 which totaled $4,647,500, less 10 percent for attorney's fees.

Application forms are available from the Bureau's Muskogee Area Office, Federal Building, Muskogee, Okla. 74401, or from David W. McKillip, Room 222, Spencer Hotel, Marion, Ind. 46952, Harrington said.

He noted that the burden of proving eligibility is on the applicant and that completed application forms should be accompanied by birth certificates and such other evidence as is necessary to trace ancestry to the person through whom eligibility is claimed. Applicants are not limited as to age, degree of Miami Indian blood, or generation, Harrington said.

A change in leadership of the Public Information Office of the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs was announced today by Commissioner Robert L. Bennett.

Virginia S. Hart, the Bureau's Chief of Public Information for the past three years, has been succeeded in that post by W. Joynes Macfarlan, for many years a member of the Washington Bureau of the Associated Press. Macfarlan's appointment was effective May 29. Mrs. Hart was named Special Assistant (Communications) to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs on May 7.

A native of Darlington, S. C., Macfarlan has been for some years the senior regular news reporter regularly covering the Department of the Interior, Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, General Services Administration, Selective Service System, Veterans Administration, and Federal Power Commission. He was also responsible for the AP's basic news coverage of the Civil Service Commission.

Macfarlan began his career with Associated Press in Charlotte, N. C. after two years as a reporter for the Columbia, S. C. "State." He served in the Navy during World War II, attaining the rank of Lieutenant Commander. Macfarlan is a member of St. Andrews' Society of Washington and is a Scottish Rite Mason.

Mrs. Hart's Federal career of approximately 12 years has included appointments as an Information Officer for the U.S. Office of Education, feature writer for the Voice of America, and publications editorial work for the Department of State. Her non-government experience includes public relations and radio production work in the Washington, D.C. area. She began her career on the Worcester (Mass.) "Evening Gazette," in her hometown. She is a member of the Women's National Press Club and the American Newspaper Women's Club, and holds an M.A. degree from American University.

Both Mrs. Hart and Macfarlan are residents of Arlington, Va.

Robert L. Bennett, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, today hailed the agreement to provide electric power for the Quinault Indian village of Queets, Wash., as "the final step in bringing the basic comforts of adequate homes to this community."

Bennett said the agreement is a "tribute to the ability of many different agencies representing several levels of government, and private enterprise to work out solutions to difficult problems." He noted that extremely complicated right-of-way problems and a multiplicity of jurisdictions created "many unusual problems that had to be solved before work could begin on the electric power transmission line."

The Bureau of Indian Affairs has built 20 new homes in Queets as part of a pilot project in total community redevelopment which includes new roads, water and sewer systems for the little fishing village on the Olympic Peninsula which until now has never had electric service.

The agreement, arrived at in consultation with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, calls for construction of a 15-mile underground power line to Queets. Participating in the agreement are the National Park Service, the State Highway Commission and the Grays Harbor Public Utilities District. The line should be finished by the end of the year, Bennett said.

"There has been wide comment on the fact that the homes the power arrived," Bennett said. "There was never any doubt responsible public officials that power would come to Queets. In the construction of the new homes we made provisions for heat, light and other available means until electricity could become available.

"We wired these homes for electricity since it is far more economical to wire a home during its construction than to go back later and install wiring. Many Indians took advantage of the opportunity to improve their homes beyond the basic house provided by the program by purchasing appliances and other improvements but the Bureau has not provided a single electrical appliance to any family in Queets."

The project is one of many "long overdue" housing programs in Indian communities, Bennett said. "There are housing programs of many types on many different Indian reservations," he said, "and where there is a good prospect that electricity will soon be available -- as in the case of Queets -- electric wiring is installed.

"I am confident that the public supports the many Federal, State and local programs designed to bridge the gap between the Indian standard of living and that of the rest of the Nation. The Queets program is just one small part of this effort, but it is an indication of the progress that can be achieved through cooperative enterprises.

A bill to provide a means of settling claims of Alaska Natives to lands in that state is being submitted to Congress today, Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall has announced.

The problem of Native Land Claims, in Alaska has been unsettled ever since an Act of May 17, 1894 provided that the Natives "shall not be disturbed in the possession of any lands actually in their use and occupation or now claimed by them, but the terms ono conditions under which such persons may acquire title to such lands is reserved for future legislation by Congress."

The Secretary described the bill as proposing "an equitable solution" to "one of the most important and difficult problems facing the State of Alaska." Claims of ownership to about 75 percent of Alaska's 365,500,000 acres have been asserted by various groups of Alaska Natives in notices filed with the Secretary of the Interior.

Alaska Natives comprise three principal groups--Indians, Aleuts, and Eskimos--who are descendants of the aboriginal occupants of Alaska. Together they compose about 20 percent of the State's total population. They live in all parts of the State, but principally in several hundred native villages scattered along the coast and inland waterways.

The Alaska Native Claims Bill, as submitted to Congress by the Department, would authorize the Secretary to grant up to 50,000 acres of federal public domain in the environs of each native village for the use and benefit of the members of the village. Reserves of land heretofore set aside for native villages would remain in effect.

Title to lands set aside to the Natives would be held in trust for 25 years. The trustee would be either the Secretary of the Interior, the state of Alaska, or a private trustee selected by the village and approved by the Secretary. State, laws, except real astute tax laws, would apply on the lands set aside for the villages.

The bill further authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to grant to village occupants 25-year hunting, fishing, and trapping permits on other federal lands beyond the village environs. Such permits could be exclusive or non-exclusive, and could be extended an additional 25 years. Hunting and fishing by natives would be subject to state and federal game laws.

In respect to Native Claims of aboriginal occupancy of areas beyond the village environs, the bill would authorize the Attorney General of Alaska to bring suit against the United States for the value of such occupancy as of 1867, the year that the United States purchased Alaska from Russia. Jurisdiction to hear the suit would be granted the United States Court of Claims, and any moneys recovered in the suit be granted the United States Court of Claims, and any moneys recovered in the suit would belong equally to the Alaska Natives. Groups of Natives who have claims pending before the Indian Claims Commission or the Court of Claims would have the option to pursue their pending claims, but if they elected to do so they could not share in any recovery made in the Attorney General's suit.

The Department of the Interior said it is not able to estimate the amount of any judgment that might be recovered for the benefit of the Alaska Natives in the Court of Claims. When the United States purchased all of Alaska from Russia in 1867, it paid $7,200,000.

The bill authorizes the appointment of a five-man commission to assist the Secretary in selecting the lands to be granted villages, preparing the village census rolls, and performing other administrative functions. Of the five members, one would be appointed from nominees submitted by native groups, end one from nominees submitted by the Governor of Alaska.

The bill provides that selections of land by the State of Alaska under the Alaska Statehood Act, as well as other public land transactions, would proceed upon the enactment of the bill even though in conflict with Native Claims. Federal lands in a village environs, however, could not be selected by the state, or otherwise disposed of, until the secretary of the Interior had determined that they would not be set aside for the benefit of the Natives of that village.

CLOVERDALE RANCHERIA TERMINATED

Twenty descendants of Porno Indians who live on the Cloverdale Rancheria in Sonoma County, California, began a new chapter in their lives recently when the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs terminated trusteeship over their lands. The termination, approved by the Indians and involving 27.5 acres of small land parcels, was the 22nd such action taken by the Bureau under the California Rancheria Act of 1958. The act provides for distribution of rancheria assets to the Indian owners and an end to Federal services. The Cloverdale Indians now have the same status as other California citizens who are taxpaying property-owners.

SENECAS PLAN NEW INDUSTRY

A recent agreement between the Seneca Nation of Indians and a newly-formed organization known as the First Seneca Corporation calls for the establishment of a factory on the Cattaraugus Reservation in New York State. The plant will manufacture decorative pillows and similar items.

The Corporation is financed principally by the Seneca Nation, which has agreed to furnish working capital and funds for construction of a 60,000 square foot factory building, machinery and equipment. The Senecas will invest approximately $800,000 in the venture. Lease terms provide for amortization of the investment over the period of the long-term lease. Tribal officials expects the new industry to provide jobs for 300 tribal members and to effectively clear up reservation unemployment.

APACHES VIEW TREE LIGHTING CEREMONY

When President Johnson threw the switch that lighted the 1965 National Community Christmas Tree in Washington, D. C. on December 17, five Apaches were with him. The White Mountain Apache Tribe were the donors of the Nation's Christmas Tree, the largest ever to grace the grassy ellipse behind the White House. The tribal delegation to the tree-lighting ceremony were Lester Oliver, Tribal chairman; Fred Banashley, vice chairman; Mary Endfield, tribal secretary; Mary V. Riley and Nelson Lupe, Sr., council members.

SPORTING GOODS FIRM TO LOCATE AT SISSETON

A leading manufacturer of sporting equipment, Herter's Inc., of Waseca, Minnesota, has announced plans to establish a new manufacturing facility at Sisseton, South Dakota, the principal community on the Sisseton Indian Reservation. The new company, to be known as Swiss Precision Industrial Armament Corporation, will produce 12-gauge shotgun shells and employ about 40 men in a two-shift operation. Many of the employees will be Sioux Indians from the Reservation. Production is expected to begin by March 1966.

Assisting in the establishment of the plant are the Sisseton Development Corporation, the South Dakota economic development agency, and the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs. The Sisseton Development Corporation will cooperate with the manufacturer in constructing three steel buildings on a 30-acre industrial site about one-half mile east of the community. Cost of the buildings is estimated at $150,000.

UINTAH AND OURAY DEDICATE NEW HOMES

The first three homes completed under a mutual-help housing program on the Uintah and Ouray Reservation in Utah were dedicated in formal ceremonies recently. The homes are part of a ten-house project which the Uintah and Ouray Tribal Housing Authority expects will be completed shortly. The Authority is planning to undertake construction of an additional 15 mutual-help houses in the spring.

Mutual help housing is a cooperative program developed by the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Public Housing Administration. Indian families contribute their labor on home construction in lieu of cash down payments. The Public Housing Administration advances funds for materials and necessary skilled labor.

PILOT TRAINING PROJECT FOR NAVAJOS

The Bureau of Indian Affairs and BVD Company of New York City are launching a pilot training program for 30 Navajos at Winslow, Arizona which could result in the eventual employment of approximately 1,000 Navajo Indians.

If the project is successful, BVD is slated to build a new plant on the Navajo Reservation in or near Tuba City, Arizona. Long-range plans call for establishment of two additional plants elsewhere on the reservation, depending upon the success of the pilot project.

INTERLOCUTORY ORDER ENTERED IN CREEK CLAIMS CASE

The Indian Claims Commission has issued an Interlocutory Order granting the sum of $1,037,414, less offsets, to the Creek Nation of Oklahoma (Docket No. 276). The Commission found that 2,037,414 acres of Creek land in Oklahoma was worth $1 an acre when ceded to the United States on August 7, 1856, and that $1 million has been paid for it. The Creek Nation must await the Commission's further action to determine offset deductions and the granting of a final award before funds will be appropriated by Congress.

ROAD PROJECTS ON COLORADO RIVER INDIAN RESERVATION

The Department of the Interior recently announced the award of a $393,633 contract to the Fisher Contracting Company of Phoenix for reshaping, surfacing and plant mix paving of more than twenty miles of road on the Colorado River Indian Reservation in Arizona. Eight other bids ranging from $406,776.85 to $610,726.50 were received.

COCHITI PUEBLO AGREES TO DAM PROJECT

The Cochiti Indian pueblo of New Mexico has approved a 50 million dollar project which will flood 4,000 acres of pueblo land through construction of a 5.3-mile earth-filled dam on the Rio Grande River.

The Indians have signed an easement with the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers and received $145,200 for granting the authority to flood the land.

Construction of Cochiti Dam, to be the second largest of its kind west of the Mississippi, is expected to provide a monthly payroll of about $500,000 and jobs for nearly 1,000 people in the area.

Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall today petitioned the Federal Power Commission for leave to intervene in the pending application by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Reservation, Montana, to compel the Montana Power Company to maintain proper amortization reserves at its Kerr Project on the Flathead River in Montana.

Secretary Udall said the Tribes have charged the Company is failing to maintain amortization reserves in the manner required by the Federal Power Act and the license.

The tribes assert they are being prejudiced by this failure since the Company's records do not fully reflect the Tribes' beneficial interest in the project, Secretary Udall said.

He said that as Secretary of the Interior he holds in trust the Tribal lands occupied by the Kerr project and therefore has an interest in assuring the Tribes receive full benefit from their lands.

The petition pointed out that the Secretary of the Interior also has specific statutory duties with respect to possible recapture by the United States of licensed projects, as provided in the Federal Power Act.

Project revenues accounted for as amortization reserves will reduce the licensee's net investment and the amount the United States will have to pay the licensee upon recapture of the project, he said. This will substantially affect the decision the United States must make with respect to each licensed project-- whether recapture is in the national interest, Secretary Udall said.

The conclusion reached by the Commission on the Flathead Indian complaint may serve as a precedent in other proceedings in which the United States will be seeking to assert its right of recapture, the petition said.

"Oklahoma! Its very name stirs memories of a long-ago Indian civilization.”

So begins “Indians of Oklahoma" - a 16-page illustrated booklet published this week as the first of a regional series to be issued by the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs. About a dozen more booklets will follow, each devoted to the history and progress of Indians in a particular state or region.

“At least 68 tribes are associated with Oklahoma's history,” Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall pointed out. "The State's name, in fact, means 'red people'. We feel that the Oklahoma booklet is the perfect choice as flagship for this new series."

Future booklets will describe the aboriginal peoples of Arizona, North Carolina, New Mexico, Alaska, the Dakotas, Florida and the Gulf Coast, Eastern States, Great Lakes Region, Northwest, Montana and Wyoming, and California, among others.

In addition to informing, the Oklahoma booklet might give the general reader a few surprises. For example:

--No Indian reservations exist in Oklahoma. Most lands passed from tribal to individual Indian ownership before the turn of the century. Today, private lands are "checker boarded" among Indian lands held in trust by the United States for individual Indians and tribes.

--No more than six of Oklahoma's 68 tribes are indigenous to the state. Others were "resettled" there from the East because of pressures exerted by white settlement. Others sought sanctuary in the area of their own accord.

--Only five percent of the original 30 million acres allotted to individual Indians remains in Indian hands. While some owners retained and benefited from their allotments, others sold out for a fraction of the land's value.

The booklet briefly traces the history of Indian migration to the State from other parts of the country, and describes their progress and problems of today. Oklahoma is unique in that most of its Indian people live among the general population and are often not recognizable as Indians apart from other citizens.

Included in the booklet is a map identifying the origin of Oklahoma tribes and 11 photographs of life among the Indians, both today and in the past. Copies are available at 15 cents apiece from Superintendent of Documents, U. S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. A discount of 25 percent is allowed on quantity orders of 100 or more, to be mailed to one address.

A total of $65.8 million was awarded to Indian tribes in judgments handed down by the Indian Claims Commission during calendar year 1965, the Bureau of Indian Affairs reported today. Appropriations to meet the judgments were made during the year in 17 of the 24 cases.

Judgment funds from land claims settlements are held in trust for the tribes by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Programs for use of the funds are developed by tribal governing bodies and approved by the Secretary of the Interior.

During the past 5 years, the trend among tribal groups has been to put such money to work by investing in business and industry on the reservations; developing of community recreation and social services; establishing college scholarship funds; and underwriting leadership training programs.

The Indian Claims Commission, an independent tribunal, was created by Congress in 1946 to hear and determine claims of tribes, bands; and other identifiable groups of American Indians living in the United States. More than 850 claims have since been filed, of which about 35 percent have been finally adjudicated. Awards totaling more than $205 million have been granted.

The award of a $2,930,848 contract for the construction of an elementary boarding school at Dilkon, Arizona was announced today by the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs.

The new school complex will make possible the closing of three small trailer schools. Construction plans call for 26 classrooms; a multipurpose building; kitchen-dining building; bus garage; two 128-pupil dormitories; 10 one-bedroom staff apartments; 20 two-bedroom houses and 30 three-bedroom houses and an instructional materials center and administration offices.

Other installations will include a 200,000-gallon ground-water storage tank; pumps and pump houses at two locations with approximately 2.5 miles of 6-inch to 12-inch diameter water mains; sewage collection system with lagoons; bituminous street paving with concrete curbs and gutters, and other ground improvements.

This work, when complete, will expand school facilities at this location to care for 780 additional pupils, beginners through the eighth grade, who are not adequately served by local public schools in their home communities.

The successful bidder was Lembke Construction Co., of Nevada, Inc., Las Vegas, Nevada. Four higher bids, ranging from $3,122,227 to $3,517,830, were received.

NEW OKLAHOMA PLASTICS PIPE PLANT WILL TRAIN INDIANS

Drilling Specialties Company, a subsidiary of Phillips Petroleum Company has announced plans to establish a plastic pipe factory in the Mid-American Industrial District, near Pryor, Oklahoma.

The Company, which expects the new plant to be operating by April, is negotiating an on-the-job training program with the Bureau of Indian Affairs to prepare Indian workers for jobs in the plastic industry. An initial group of 20 Cherokees will be employed, with the figure doubling when full-scale operations are reached.

Pryor, in the heart of Oklahoma Cherokee country, has a notable record of cooperation with the Bureau, and with State and local development agencies, in creating new jobs for Indians.

NEW MEXICO FIRM WILL TRAIN INDIANS

Typical of the many companies that utilize the opportunity to train Indian workers on-the-job under contracts with the Bureau of Indian Affairs is Mt. Taylor Millwork, Inc., of Grants, New Mexico. The company recently negotiated a $6,025 contract to train nine Indians for jobs in the manufacture of lineal molding.

On-the-job training is part of the Bureau’s overall Employment Assistance Program which combats Indian unemployment through training, placement, and the creation of an ever-increasing pool of trained Indian workers.

TIMBER ENTERPRISE THRIVES AT FORT APACHE

The Fort Apache Timber Company, an enterprise of the White Mountain Apache Tribe of Arizona, reports that it is showing a substantial profit. The company began operations in a new sawmill on August 31, 1963. P.N. 74966-66.

The successful operation is traced to a reorganization carried out in May 1964 involving a change in plant management and improvements in milling, woods management, and sales operations, the Bureau of Indian Affairs reported.

WATER EXPLORATION AT BIA SCHOOL SITES

Wells ranging in depths from 100 feet to 1,600 feet are being drilled at seven locations of schools operated by the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Arizona and New Mexico. The drilling, conducted by L. P. Cromer, of Laveen, Arizona, under a $94,400 contract awarded by the Bureau, will seek to supplement the water supply for school plants at Wide Ruins, Beautiful Valley, Gray Hill, Polacca, Cibecue, and Cedar Creek, in Arizona, and at Huerfano, New Mexico. Outcome of the exploration program will determine the feasibility of new or additional facilities at these sites.

CHEROKEE MOTEL PAYS AHEAD ON BIA LOAN

Boundary Tree Motel, at the southern gateway to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in North Carolina, reported that 1965 was the best year in its 20- year history. As a result, the owners--the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians-- have paid ten years ahead, through 1975, the principal installments on a loan extended by the Bureau of Indian Affairs to finance the operation.

The attractive guest lodge, host to thousands of reservation visitors each year, boasts a swimming pool, dining room seating 300, snack bar, and service station. During peak operations in the summer season, the enterprise provides employment for about 70 Cherokees.

RED LAKE MILL TO BE REBUILT

When a fire destroyed their tribal sawmill at Redby, Minnesota, last December 3, the Chippewa Indians of Red Lake Reservation went into action to restore operations. The Red Lake Tribal Council passed a resolution authorizing rebuilding of the mill, which employs 70 tribal members, and plans are now well underway for completion of a new plant by next September.

Construction on the main mill building, a 50 by 150 foot steel structure, will start as soon as spring thaw comes. Work on auxiliary buildings will begin at once under a contract with the Mater Division of the Appleton Machine Company, Appleton, Wisconsin, the company which will also provide engineering services and supply and install new equipment. Total cost of rebuilding the enterprise is estimated at $370,000.

Meanwhile, provision has been made for those whose jobs were Wiped out by the fire. About half of the millworkers were set to work preparing the mill site for rebuilding. Still others are engaged in logging to keep timber coming in for operation of a portable mill that was quickly installed. When a second portable mill is installed soon, all former mill workers will be employed again, utilizing timber on hand and supplying customers.