OPA

ELECTRONICS COMPANY TO TRAIN CROW INDIANS

The newly established U. S. Automatics Corporation plant on the Crow Reservation in Montana has negotiated a $17,475 contract with the Bureau of Indian Affairs to provide on-the-job training for 35 Crow Indians. The company, which has home offices in Pewaukee, Wisconsin, manufactures electronic components, mainly timing and regulating devices.

BOAT BUILDER TO LOCATE IN PRYOR. OKLAHOMA

Classic Manufacturing Company, builder of fiberglass pleasure boats, has announced that it will open a branch plant in Pryor, Oklahoma, within two months. The company, which has home offices in Santa Ana, California, will lease an 18,000 square foot building from Pryor's Mid-American Industrial District.

Classic expects to negotiate an on-the-job training contract with the Bureau of Indian Affairs to train an initial group of 15 Cherokee Indians for jobs in the new plant. About 30 Indians will be employed when full operations begin.

LOS ANGELES COUNTY RENEWS TRAINING CONTRACT

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has renewed a $47,150.contract with the Bureau of Indian Affairs to provide on-the-job training for 155 Indian women. The trainees will work toward certificates as nurses' aides and surgical nursing technicians during the contract period from July 1, 1965 through June 30, 1966.

MORE INDIANS IN FORESTRY JOBS

Increasing numbers of Indian workers are employed in forest industries, according to employment surveys conducted by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. In 1964, Indians accounted for 2,300 of the total 12,900 permanent employees in logging and milling operations on or near reservations. An additional 1,000 or more Indians were employed in seasonal and short-term jobs connected with forestry operations.

In addition to those employed in commercial logging and wood processing operations, there are 110 Indians on the permanent forestry staff of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, comprising more than one-third of the staff.

THREE ACTIONS BY THE INDIAN CLAIMS COMMISSION

Winnebago

The Indian Claims Commission has issued an interlocutory order in a case (Dockets 243, 244, and 245) involving claims by the Winnebago Tribe for compensation for lands in Wisconsin and Illinois that were ceded to the United States under three treaties during the past century. The Commission's order stated the following values for the three parcels of land at the time they were ceded:

2,702,444 acres, ceded under the treaty of January 2, 1830, had a value of $2,025,000;

2,101,455 acres, ceded under the treaty of February 13, 1833, then worth $1,575,000; and 2,981,303 acres, of land ceded under the treaty of June 15, 1838, worth $1,500,000 when ceded.

With issuance of this order, determination of the remaining issues in the case will now proceed.

Cheyenne-Arapaho of Oklahoma

The Indian Claims Commission has approved a compromise settlement of $15 million for claims of the Cheyenne-Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma (Docket Nos. 329-A and 329-B). The amount represents additional payment for their one-half interest in 51,210,000 acres ceded to the United States by the Indians under various treaties and for 4,608,878 acres of their reservation taken under the Agreement of 1890. The lands concerned are located in the present States of Montana, Nebraska, Kansas, Colorado, South Dakota, and Oklahoma. The funds have been deposited in the Treasury, where they are drawing interest at four percent per annum.

Northern Paiute

The Indian Claims Commission has entered final judgment in the case of the Northern Paiute Indians, Docket No. 87, granting an award of $935,000 as payment for 3,118,000 acres of land in Nevada and California identified as Area I or the Bono Tract; and an award of $15,790,000 as payment for 11,614,726 acres of land in Nevada and California. The lands in California were taken in 1853 and those in Nevada in 1862 and 1863. Previously an award of $3,650,000 had been granted as payment for 11,500,000 acres in Nevada and Oregon identified as Area III or the Snake Tract taken in 1872. The total Paiute judgment is the largest so far to a single tribe. The “Indians of California" -- a group composed of many tribes-- received a previous award of $29.1 million.

COMMISSIONER NASH ADDRESSED NCAl

Commissioner Philleo Nash of the Bureau of Indian Affairs recently urged American Indians to plead their common cause as Indians, not only as tribal representatives. Speaking at Scottsdale, Arizona, before the Annual Conference of the National Congress of American Indians, Commissioner Nash said, "It is my greatest hope that this organization will one day--and soon--become a major focal point for Indian self-expression. I hope that it will grow in wealth and membership to a stature that will make it a mighty force in Indian affairs--a force through which a half million Americans can speak with united purpose.“

The way has been cleared for construction of a $50-million dam and reservoir on Cochiti Pueblo in New Mexico with approval of an easement agreement by the Pueblos, the Army's Corps of Engineers and the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs.

The agreement covers 4,000 acres of Cochiti Pueblo land, for which the Pueblo will receive a settlement of $145,200, plus all right to develop recreation facilities in the area.

The dam, a major Rio Grande flood prevention project, will create a permanent 1,200-surface-acre lake on pueblo lands approximately 50 miles north of Albuquerque, New Mexico. Slated for completion in 1970, the new facility promises to become a major recreation resource for the people of northern New Mexico.

Cochiti Pueblo will celebrate the long-awaited signing of the agreement at a ceremony on Sunday, December 12.

Planners forecast a total of 800,000 recreation visits to the site the first year of operation, with visits increasing each year. The area will play a vital role in the State's new comprehensive recreation plan, according to officials of the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

The Indians plan to invest their easement funds in commercial and recreational facilities in the lake area to provide income and employment opportunities for members of the pueblo. They also are planning to lease sites to private investors for commercial development, providing still more employment for the Pueblos.

Most of the dam and reservoir will be located on the original Spanish land grant received by Cochiti Pueblo from the king of Spain on September 25, 1689. Congress confirmed the grant by the Act of December 22, 1858, and a patent covering the grant was issued by President Lincoln on November 1, 1864.

The Cochiti Pueblo consists of 26,500 acres of desert and mountainous forest land some 30 miles southwest of Santa Fe. Until now, its income has been derived principally from 900 acres of farmlands and some 27,000 acres of rangelands, together with small timber and mineral holdings. Some of the Indians have found jobs in the surrounding area. Makers of excellent pottery, the Cochitis also are famous for their drums made of hollowed cottonwood logs.

A White Mountain Apache tribal delegation from Arizona will arrive in Washington Saturday, December 11, poised for a full week of activities prior to the official Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony slated for next Friday.

The five-member delegation, representing the Tribe which donated the Nation's Christmas tree this year, will be composed of: Lester Oliver, Tribal Chairman; Fred Banashley, Vice-Chairman; Mary Enfield; Mary V. Riley; and Nelson Lupe, Sr.

Activities will include a visit to Children's Hospital, the German School in McLean, Virginia and the Catoctin Job Corps Camp at Catoctin, Maryland. They will also attend the United National Concert at Constitution Hall on Sunday, December 12, where they are slated to present a gift from the Tribe to Vice-President Hubert H. Humphrey.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs will honor the delegation at a reception in the BIA Auditorium, 1951 Constitution Avenue NW., on Thursday, December 16, at 2 p.m.

The tree, Which arrived by flat car in Washington December 2, stood 101 feet tall on its mountain perch. Even when pruned down so that it could be eased out of its hideaway, it reaches 85 feet skyward on the White House lawn. An Apache crane operator guided the steel claws that eased the tree from its native place, and Apache timber men helped trim and tie its giant branches and wrap the tree in plastic sheeting for its journey.

When the switch is flipped on December 17, lighting the 1,000 colored bulbs to signal the beginning of the 1965 Pageant for Peace, Tribal Council Chairman 1liver will be on the platform.

Back on the reservation, some 4,000 members of the Tribe have seen to it that their Christmas tree gift will be remembered for many a year. Where once it stood in lonely splendor on a remote mountainside, its site will be marked with a plaque. The trail that leads there from the Apache capital of Whiteriver will be smoothed into a road that tourists can travel.

Just before the bend in the trail where the tree stood there will be a new lake. Fed by the water of two Creeks, Sun and Moon, which once nourished the tree, the lake will be 41 acres in surface area. It has been created for protection and propagation of a species of trout, the Salmo Gila, that is found only on the White Mountain Reservation. Some of these fish have already been captured in the high mountain streams and transplanted into the creeks. The floodgates were held shut until the Christmas tree had been removed November 15, and now the waters are beginning to flow into the new recreation area. Although originally to be called Sun-Moon Lake, the Tribe is now thinking about changing the name to Christmas Tree Lake.

There is another manmade recreational water area, Hawley Lake, on the White Mountain Apache Reservation, built about ten years ago. It has provided considerable income to the Tribe, whose means of livelihood are limited by the mountainous terrain and isolation of their reservation.

Although the White Mountain Apaches (one of four Apache groups in the southwest) live in relative isolation, they are trying to make the most of their resources. Some families still live in the traditional straw huts called wickiups, but others are living in new low-cost public housing which they have bought with "sweat equity," substituting their labor for cash down payments under a special arrangement with the Public Housing Administration.

The tribal population has doubled since the turn of the century. Some of the children attend school in a former army headquarters building and play on the troop parade ground. But more children are attending a new, modern, well-staffed public elementary and secondary school at Whiteriver. Tribal elders feel that the new school broadens horizons for their children--and they will need educated Apaches if they try to expand their forestry and ranching industries and tourist facilities.

For these reasons, the visiting Apache delegation will confer with Indian Commissioner Philleo Nash on further plans for economic development of the White Mountain Reservation during the coming week. The Bureau of Indian Affairs provides loans and technical aid for economic improvement of Indian properties.

Owen D. Morken, career employee of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, will take over as new Director for the Bureau at Juneau, Alaska, January 2, 1966, Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall announced today.

Morken has been assistant area director for economic development at Aberdeen, South Dakota, since the spring of 1962. At Juneau he succeeds Robert L. Bennett, who is now the Deputy Commissioner of Indian Affairs in Washington, D. C.

A native of Brainerd, Minnesota, and a social science graduate of Bemidji State Teachers College, Morken joined the Bureau of Indian Affairs in the Civilian Conservation Corps program in 1939. After working in various assignments at the Pipestone School, the Hopi and Navajo Reservations and the Minnesota Agency, he was appointed Superintendent of the Fort Berthold Agency, New Town, North Dakota in January of 1957. While there he was given the Governor John E. Davis leadership award for community betterment and other recognition for his work in economic development.

In 1960 he was transferred to the Pierre Agency, Pierre, South Dakota, where his work in community development not only was effective with the Indian people, but was also singled out for praise by the Pierre, South Dakota, Chamber of Commerce. Since April of 1962, he has been the Assistant Area Director in Aberdeen in charge of Resource and Economic Development.

Secretary Udall said, "I believe that Mr. Morken's experiences in helping tribes to program judgment funds and in working with the Indian people, their neighboring communities, and local and State governments have demonstrated his ability to handle the important Alaskan assignment. These are all very important to the Tlingit-Haida people, who are awaiting settlement of their claim, and to the other native people of the State, whose future is an integral part of Alaska's future as a State."

Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall today announced the establishment of new Bureau of Indian Affairs area offices at Window Rock, Arizona, and Albuquerque, New Mexico.

An administrative staff to serve both new offices will remain in Gallup, New Mexico and some of the personnel assigned to Window Rock will continue to have headquarters there.

The office at Window Rock, to be designated the Navajo Area Office will serve a reservation the size of the State of West Virginia. The Navajo Tribe of nearly 100,000 people constitutes over one-fifth of the total Indian population under Federal trusteeship.

The Albuquerque Area Office will serve the tribes located in New Mexico and Colorado now being served by the Gallup Area Office through the following agencies which will continue: The Consolidated Ute Agency at Ignacio, Colorado; the Jicaril1a Apache Agency at Dulce, New Mexico; United Pueblos Agency, Albuquerque, New Mexico; Mescalero Agency at Mescalero, New Mexico; Zuni Agency at Zuni, New Mexico; and the Institute of American Indian Arts at Santa Fe, New Mexico.

"The establishment of the Navajo Area Office is intended to provide better coordinated and more effective services to America's largest Indian group," Secretary Udall said. "Since the Navajos represent such a large part of the total Indian population of the United States, this move will be most helpful in advancing the overall programs of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. It was one of the recommendations of the Task Force on Indian Affairs which I appointed in 1961.”

Udall said that the other tribes presently combined with the Navajos under the jurisdiction of the Gallup Area Office include nearly 30,000 Indians, more than are covered by most of the Indian Bureau's nine other regional offices. “Considering their numbers and the opportunities for social and economic development which are available to them, these Indians also merit the special attention they will get through having an Area Office separate from the large Navajo tribe," Udall said.

The new Area Director at Window Rock will be Graham E. Holmes, currently Assistant Commissioner for Legislation in the Washington office of the Indian Bureau. Holmes previously served as Director of the Bureau's Area Office in Muskogee, Oklahoma, and at one time was an Assistant Area Director in Gallup. He has been the Superintendent of the Rosebud Sioux Reservation in South Dakota, and Assistant Solicitor for Indian Affairs for the Department of the Interior. He is a native of Oklahoma.

Glenn R. Landbloom, who for the past seven years has been General Superintendent of the Navajo Reservation, will become the Area Director of the Indian Bureau's office in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Prior to joining the Navajo Agency staff, Landbloom was an Assistant Area Director in Aberdeen, South Dakota. He is a graduate of North Dakota State University.

Named as Area Director for the New Albuquerque office is Walter O. Olson, presently General Superintendent of the United Pueblos Agency. He is a former Assistant Area Director in Gallup and Superintendent of the Mescalero Apache Agency in New Mexico.

Fredrick M. Haverland, who has been Gallup Area Director since 1962 will join the Washington staff of the Indian Bureau for an assignment with the Commissioner's Office. He formerly directed the Bureau's Area Office in Phoenix and was an Assistant Area Director previously in Billings, Montana, and Muskogee, Oklahoma.

In order to begin staffing the new Albuquerque office, the Indian Bureau expects to transfer about 24 persons from Gallup. The total planned Albuquerque complement of 116 will be reached over the next 12 to 18 months, largely through the transfer of persons now employed in Gallup.

Although Window Rock will be the location of the Navajo Area Office, there is not expected to be any increase in the number of Bureau employees stationed there. Instead, Bureau personnel now on the Navajo Agency staff will be moved into positions with the new Window Rock office. Approximately 185 persons - out of the present total of 309 - will remain in Gallup, most of them to provide administrative and supporting services to both new Area Offices.

Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall today announced an agreement between the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Radio Corporation of America which will provide young natives of Alaska and American Indians with broad opportunities for electronics training and for jobs in the worldwide RCA communications and defense warning systems.

The agreement, Secretary Udall said, not only opens new doors of economic advancement to Indians and Alaska natives but also will assist the defense of the United States.

Under the agreement technical training in electronics will be given to the qualified Indian and Alaska native students at two RCA institutes in New York City and Los Angeles, Calif. Job opportunities will be available to the graduates at missile tracking and other defense warning or communications installations operated by RCA throughout the free world.

The first contingent of seven Alaska natives is leaving Fairbanks by RCA plane, Friday, February 24, for New York City where they will be enrolled at the RCA Institute for the new term starting February 28, Those who complete the training successfully will be employed in Alaska to man the White Alice Communications System and the Ballistic Missile Early Warning System (BMEWS).

In addition, RCA plans to send personnel specialists to Alaska in the near future to interview native high school students concerning jobs and training following their graduation this coming spring.

Use of technically trained natives to staff the installations in Alaska, Secretary Udall pointed out, will be beneficial not only to the economy of the northernmost State but also from the standpoint of national defense. In the past, he added, technicians have had to be brought in from the other States at great expense.

An increase in the "standard" royalty rate for oil and gas leases on Indian lands from 12.5 to 16-2/3 percent was announced today by the Department of the Interior.

The higher rate, Acting Commissioner of Indian Affairs John O. Crow explained, has been used for many years in the Osage area of Oklahoma and more recently in the Aneth area of the Navajo Reservation in southeastern Utah and on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming. Experience in these areas, he added, has shown that a 16-2/3 percent royalty is justified and will be generally beneficial to the Indian landowners. He also pointed out that during the past several years there has been an upward price spiral for oil and gas leases and royalty rates have been raised on much of the non-Indian land of the country.

In a memorandum of February 21 to all area directors of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Acting Commissioner Crow advised them that "the royalty rate in future oil and gas leases shall be fixed at 16-2/3 percent except that a higher rate should be used in areas where there is strong competition.”

Upon notice that an order had been entered granting leave to appear in a New Mexico court action involving Navajo Indian voting rights, Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall today designated Max N. Edwards, Assistant to the Secretary and Legislative Counsel, to represent him at a hearing in the Bernalillo County District Court at Albuquerque, N. Mex., on March 14 in a suit brought there last December 23 by Joseph A. Montoya, defeated Democratic candidate for lieutenant governor in last November1s general election.

Montoya lost by a margin of 287 votes to Thomas Bolack, Republican candidate, and filed suit to cancel all votes by members of the Navajo nation on the grounds they live on a reservation and are not residents of New Mexico. The State statute requires residency within the State for a period of at least one year.

Secretary Udall’s motion to appear as a friend of the court, with right to file a brief and participate in the oral arguments was airmailed last Friday, and Judge John McManus of the Second Judicial District received the motion and signed the order today.

Earlier, Norman Littell, Washington attorney who is general counsel for the Navajos, filed a motion for leave to appear for the Navajos as friends of the court, and this motion was likewise granted.

Judge McManus has fixed cost bonds of $25,000 to be required of both parties to the contest.

Assistant Secretary of the Interior George W. Abbott today announced approval of a public land order restoring to tribal ownership about 1,161 acres of scattered tracts on the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation in North Dakota.

The lands being restored were ceded to the United States by the Indians many years ago and were opened to settlement and entry under the homestead laws in 1911. These particular tracts, however, have not been sold or disposed of over the 50-year period.

Their restoration to tribal ownership was requested by the Three Affiliated Tribes of the Fort Berthold Reservation - Arickaree, Mandan and Gros Ventres - to meet the resettlement needs of tribal members displaced from their homes by construction of the Garrison Dam and reservoir project.

The restoration is effective immediately.

Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall announced today the appointment of W. W. Keeler, Bartlesville, Okla., as consultant on planning policy and reorganization of functions of the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

Mr. Keeler, executive vice president of the Phillips Petroleum Company and principal chief of the Cherokee Indian Tribe of Oklahoma, has agreed to serve without compensation for a period of 90 days starting February 5.

Born in 1908 at Dalhart, Texas, where his parents were temporarily located in connection with his father's cattle business, Mr. Keeler grew up in Bartlesville and first joined the Phillips Company on summer vacation work in the engineering department at the age of 16.

In 1926 he was graduated from Bartlesville high school and entered the University of Kansas engineering school. Three years later he became permanently associated with Phillips, holding down a full-time job in the refinery at Kansas City, Kansas, while continuing his studies at the University. Over the years he rose steadily in the company's organization and was elected executive vice president in 1956.

Early in 1952 Mr. Keeler was appointed Director of refining in the Petroleum Administration for Defense, Washington, D. C., and served in this post one year without compensation. Since 1954 he has been chairman of the Military Petroleum Advisory Board.

Born of Cherokee Indian ancestry, Mr. Keeler has long been active in welfare and educational work among the Indians of Oklahoma. In 1948 he was elected vice chairman of the executive committee of the Cherokee Nation and late in 1949 was appointed principal chief of the tribal organization by former President Harry S. Truman. He is still serving in this post and is also a member of the Commission on the Rights, Liberties and Responsibilities of the American Indian, a study group sponsored by the Fund for the Republic.

In 1957 he received the All-American Indian Award, which is presented annually to an outstanding American Indian.

Mr. Keeler is extremely active in the civic affairs of Bartlesville and in numerous organizations connected with the petroleum industry.

He is married to the former Ruby Hamilton of Industry, Kansas, and has three sons.