OPA

Timber cuts and sales reached an all-time high resulting in increased employment for several thousand Indians during the fiscal year ended June 30, 1964, the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Indian Affairs announced today.

The total volume cut under contract and paid permit was nearly 741 million board feet, an increase of 200 million board feet over the previous 12 months. Cash receipts rose $3 million during the same period, to a new high of $11.5 million.

Timber resources remain one of the greatest of the income-producing potentials on Indian reservations. During the past four years, the Bureau has concentrated its efforts upon more effective management and use of Indian forest holdings as one phase of the overall effort to improve the economy of reservations.

Contributing recently to the success of the effort has been legislation endorsed by the Department of the Interior and enacted in April. 1964 (P.L. 88- 301) which facilitates Bureau management of Indian timber resources by amending a 1910 Act under which the Bureau's staff has been operating.

Increased sales during fiscal year 1964 were noted in all parts of the country where Indian-held timber stands exist, with the exception of the Sacramento, California area. In the Sacramento area, the sales volume in recent years has remained consistently close to the maximum allowable annual cut.

The 1964 record is attributed to a planned increase in timber sale offerings combined with more favorable market conditions in the wood-using industries; large-scale inventories of standing timber financed through the Area Redevelopment Administration; and the start of production at three new tribally-owned sawmills on the Jicarilla-Apache Reservations in New Mexico, Fort Apache Reservation in Arizona, and the Red Lake Reservation in Minnesota.

It has been estimated that the fiscal 1964 cut created year-long jobs for between 5,000 and 7,000 men, most of them Indians, in various phases of the wood-using industries located on or near reservations. Most of the jobs were in areas of chronic underemployment. The stepped-up pace of cutting and sales has continued since July 1 of this year.

A 10-man delegation, headed by the Principal Chief of the Cherokee Indian Tribe of Oklahoma, and including three other Indians and two Interior Department officers, has been named to represent the United States at the Fifth Quadrennial Conference of the Inter-American Indian Institute to be held in Quito, Ecuador October 19-25.

W. W. Keeler, of Bartlesville, Oklahoma will lead the United States delegation. He is Principal Chief of the Cherokees, and Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Phillips Petroleum Company. Mr. Keeler headed the Task Force on Indian Affairs appointed by Secretary Udall in 1961 and in that' capacity helped formulate current Federal policy in relation to Indians. He was also Chairman of another Secretarial task force appointed in 1962 to study conditions among the Indians and Eskimos of Alaska and to recommend Federal policy relating to them.

Other Indian delegates are as follows:

Irvin Santiago, Governor of Laguna Pueblo, New Mexico, and a member of the Tribal Council for six years. Governor Santiago was appointed by President Johnson to the National Citizens Committee on Community Relations. He is a member of the New Mexico Advisory Committee on Civil Rights and this year represents the Governor of New Mexico on the Governors' Interstate Council on Indian Affairs.

Robert Jim, of Toppenish, Washington, a member of the Trial Council of the Yakima Indians and officer of four key tribal committees. He is Chairman of the Fish, Wildlife and Law and Order Committee; Chairman of the Legislative Committee; Secretary of the Loan, Extension, Education, and Housing Committee; and Secretary of the Enrollment Committee.

Mrs. Agnes Savilla, of Parker, Arizona, a long-standing member of the Council of the Colorado River Tribes. A Mojave Indian, she is Chairman of the Council's Committee on Health, Education and Welfare.

Representing the Department of the Interior will be Dr. James E. Officer, Associate Commissioner of Indian Affairs, and Newton W. Edwards, Special Assistant to the Assistant Secretary for Public Land Management.

Other United States delegates will be: Dr. William H. Kelly, Director of the Bureau of Ethnic Research, University of Arizona; Dr. Erwin Rabeau, Deputy Chief, Division of Indian Health, United states Public Health Service; Mrs. Elizabeth Enochs, Senior Social Adviser of Economic Resources Office, Agency for International Development, Washington, D. C.; and Earl Lubensky, Political Affairs Officer, United States Embassy, Quito, Ecuador.

The United States will also be represented by social scientists who will present technical papers on community development.

The Inter-American Indian Institute, headquartered in Mexico City, was established in 1940 by an international convention. It is a specialized technical agency of the Organization of American States and functions as a clearing house for information about activities carried on by the member governments for the benefit of their Indian populations.

The Quito conference this month will focus on economic development programs for Indian tribes and communities, an issue of increasing interest to member governments.

The Department of the Interior today announced adoption of new regulations establishing uniformity in Indian tribal voting matters concerning tribal constitutions, by-laws and constitutional amendments. The regulations apply only to the 76 tribes which were reconstructed pursuant to the Indian Reorganization Act of June 18, 1934, and do not affect the 72 tribes in Oklahoma and Alaska which voted to exclude themselves from application.

The new regulations establish definite procedures for creating voting districts, posting election notices, setting polling hours, preparing voting lists and clarifying voter eligibility.

Indian tribes, bands, and communities generally operate under a tribal organization. The Bureau of Indian Affairs encourages the tribes to develop written constitutions.

The new uniform voting regulations will facilitate revision of tribal constitutions by eliminating the need for approval by the Secretary of voting regulations in each instance of a proposed constitutional change.

The full text of the new regulations is being published in the Federal Register. These regulations were published as proposed rulemaking in the Federal Register on June 26, 1963, and public comments were invited. Several modifications were made in the light of public comments received.

The appointment of Dr. Gordon Macgregor as Special Assistant was announced today by the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Indian Affairs. He has been assigned to the office of the Assistant Commissioner for Economic Development. He will coordinate programs for the social and economic growth of imp0¥erished Indian communities.

An anthropologist and specialist in community development, Dr. Macgregor will help coordinate long-range social and economic improvement plans for Indian reservations and will serve as liaison with the Office of Economic Opportunity in helping to chart Indian community action projects under the anti-poverty program.

Dr. Macgregor returns to the Bureau after a 15 year absence. He first entered the Indian service in 1936 as a specialist for tribal organization and served later in the division of Indian education and as superintendent of the Northern Cheyenne Reservation. During the 1950's he served for two years with Interior's Office of Territories and with the Agency for International Development, both assignments focusing on economic and social planning. For the past seven years he has been engaged in research and development of community health services for the Public Health Service of the Department of Health, Education and Welfare.

A graduate of Yale in 1925, Dr. Macgregor holds a Ph. D. from Harvard. He is the author of several monographs and studies, including Warriors Without Weapons, a study of the Pine Ridge Sioux of South Dakota. He was born in Haverhill, Massachusetts, and is now a resident of Falls Church, Virginia.

Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall announced today that the Bureau of Indian Affairs is prepared to make a per capita judgment distribution of funds totaling approximately $548,000 to all persons who are members or can prove ancestry with those Paiute bands whose chiefs and headmen signed the Treaty of December la, 1868.

Those considering themselves eligible for enrollment should contact the Bureau of Indian Affairs' Office in Portland, Oregon, regarding applications.

The funds cover a 1960 judgment of the Indian Claims Commission in favor of the Snake or Paiute Indians of the former Malheur Reservation in Oregon. Distribution of the funds is authorized by Public Law 88-464, signed August 20, 1964. The preparation of a roll to serve as basis for the distribution will be under the direction of the Area Director, Bureau of Indian Affairs, Box 3785, Portland, Oregon. May 21, 1965 has been set as the deadline for accepting applications, in accordance with the Act.

Public Law 88-464 directs that all persons of Paiute Indian ancestry are eligible for enrollment providing: 1. They were born on or prior to and living on August 20, 1964

2. They are members of or descendants of members of the bands whose chiefs and headmen signed the unratified Treaty of December 10, 1868

3. They relinquish any rights they might have to participate as beneficiaries in the awards granted in Docket 87 of the Northern Paiute Nation claim.

The Paiute Indians who may be eligible are now principally found in the Burns and Warm Springs Reservations in Oregon and others may be scattered throughout the California-Nevada-Oregon area. Until applications have been received and evaluated, there is no way of determining the number of persons who will be eligible to share in the award.

Specific regulations to be followed in effecting the distribution are being published in the Federal Register. They include provisions for appealing rejections, handling the share of minors and insuring that persons in the armed forces overseas will not be overlooked.

Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall today described as "welcome news" the plan to establish a $500,000 plastics molding plant at Durant, Okla., which will provide jobs for upwards of 100 Indian men and women. The new installation is being built by a subsidiary of Strombecker Corp., a Chicago manufacturer.

"It is highly gratifying, “Secretary Udall said, "that this industry has chosen to locate a new plant in the mid-State area where many Indians live--and where many are in need of jobs Full-scale cooperation between the industry, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and State and local officials in Oklahoma have resulted in benefits not only for the Indian population but for the community as a whole.

"The Strombecker plant in Durant signals another step forward in our effort to improve the economic lot of American Indians--an effort that has gained great momentum in the past four years, It Forty other plants have been assisted in locating on or near Indian communities in recent years, providing jobs for 1,500 Indians and promising employment for more than double that number as production reaches full capacity. Negotiations are under way with several more expanding businesses. The industries presently operating represent a wide variety of enterprises, including, for example, diamond cutting, electronics parts assembly, textile manufacturing, and production of Indian-design gift items.

The Bureau of Indian Affairs worked with the Durant Industrial Foundation, a community corporation created to assist in financing new industry, and the Oklahoma State Department of Commerce and Industry in helping pave the way for establishing the plastics enterprise in Durant. Operations will begin in a new, 30,000-square-foot structure.

“The Bureau's role is that of catalytic agent," Commissioner of Indian Affairs Philleo Nash said. "Our Industrial Development staff brings together industries in search of new locations and communities in search of new enterprises. Much of the attraction for industries locating on or near Indian reservations lies in the availability of workers. Indians have demonstrated a high degree of manual dexterity and pride in precision workmanship. With training, provided through Bureau funds, they are the answer to a chronic need of many employers."

Production at the new installation, to occupy a 25-acre tract on the western edge of Durant, is scheduled to start in June. At the outset, approximately 75 people will be employed. The payroll will be increased as output gains.

The Miccosukees of Florida, kin to the Seminoles and Creeks, but consistently aloof from both tribal organizations, have emerged from the Everglades after more than a century and are now going into their own tribal business.

With a constitution and bylaws that were formulated and approved in January 1962, the Miccosukees are now, for the first time in the history of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, accepting Federal aid from the United States.

The Department of the Interior reports that December 19 is set for the dedication of their first tribal enterprise--a restaurant financed in part by a $150,000 Bureau loan. Located 40 miles west of Miami, it is expected to attract the steady stream of tourists who travel U. S. 41, the Tamiami Trail. The restaurant and an adjacent new filling station are expected to provide employment to tribal members and produce revenue for the tribal budget. The enterprise, to be maintained by Miccosukee workmen and staffed with Miccosukee waitresses, has already brought some measure of prosperity to Miccosukee families. Tribal members were among the construction workers.

The restaurant is only the beginning. Ground was broken earlier this month for a two-room schoolhouse to serve the three dozen school-age Miccosukees who are enrolled tribal members. At present these children, ranging in ages from 6 to 15, are attending class in a one-room portable structure provided by Dade County. The Bureau of Indian Affairs will finance the new school and has already provided two teachers.

A community center and 15 modern “chickees” will complete the Miccosukee tribal complex. Construction of the multipurpose center will be financed by the Bureau, and the homes will be underwritten by the Public Housing Administration. A model house, already completed, retains the traditional thatched roof (under which is modern beam-and-board roofing) and is composed of four large rooms, kitchen and bath. The local public power company has sent homemaking demonstrators to the Miccosukees to show women how to use the modern stoves, refrigerators and other appliances that will change the way of family life on this stretch of the Tamiami Trail.

There are 140 enrolled members of the Miccosukee Tribe, but the Bureau employees who have been working with them estimate that there are probably 200 or more other Miccosukees who are living in the Everglades area and it is expected that they will eventually take part in the tribal activities. The Bureau of Indian Affairs is providing job training so that tribal members may be employed in the tribal ventures.

The Miccosukees are no strangers to residents of southern Florida. Jimmy Tiger's Indian Village--the homestead of his family and relatives about 30 miles west of Miami on the Tamiami Trail--is open to the public; and a crafts shop markets Jackets, blouses, skirts and similar clothing of Miccosukee creation and design, as well as moccasins and other handicrafts from the Cherokee Reservation in North Carolina.

While crafts work is not as prevalent among the Miccosukees as among some of the tribes of the Southwest, visitors to the new restaurant and other buildings being planned will be able to feast their eyes upon a variety of Indian-made artifacts created by Indian art students as part of the interior decor. (The students attend the Institute of American Indian Art in Santa Fe, New Mexico, operated by the Bureau of Indian Affairs.) For example, the windows in the restaurant, an i-frame structure, will be decorated with fenestrations by a youthful Seneca weaver. Paintings, sculpture, lamps, murals, and even the stone carvings on the concrete buttresses are products of the Institute's students, all Indians, who represent several tribes from all parts of the United States. The motif is in keeping with the tropical environment and faithful to Miccosukee tradition.

Why, after centuries of isolation in the Everglades, have the Miccosukees decided to change their way of life? Philleo Nash, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, suggests a reason:

“The Miccosukees," Nash says, "recognize the root of the Indian's problem today--he is often so far removed from the mainstream of American society that he gets only the backwash. The Miccosukees are learning to choose, in this time of change, the things they should keep and the things they must discard."

Perry E. Skarra, a specialist in resources management for Indian trust land, has been appointed chief of the Bureau of Indian Affairs' branch of forestry, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Philleo Nash announced today.

He succeeds George S. Kephart, who retired from Federal service on December 28 after 31 years of service. Skarra will supervise forest use and improvement operations on nearly 13 million acres of Indian-owned forest lands held in trust by the Federal Government. He comes to the Washington post from a 10-year assignm0nt as assistant director of the Bureau's area office in Portland, Oregon. Prior to 1954 he served for four years 88 superintendent of the Yakima Indian reservation in Washington. He also has held various forestry posts wi.th the Bureau I s field establishments and with the Forest Service, Department of Agriculture.

Born in Hancock, Michigan, Skarra was graduated from the University of Minnesota in 1938 with a B. S. in forestry. He is a member of the American Forestry Association and the Society of American Foresters.

Appointment of Paul L. Winsor as area director for the Bureau of Indian Affairs at Minneapolis, Minn., was announced today by Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall. He succeeds James E. Hawkins, who recently transferred to the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, which the Interior Department administers for the United States under a United Nations trusteeship.

Winsor has been assistant area director at Minneapolis since February 1963. He first joined the Bureau in 1951 as a principal-school teacher at Hooper Bay, Alaska. Later he transferred to Juneau, Alaska, as an administrative assistant and subsequently was named assistant to the area director of the Juneau Area Office. He held increasingly responsible positions with the Juneau offic8 until 1959, when he left Federal service to accept a cabinet post as Commissioner of Health and Welfare for the State of Alaska.

In his new post, Winsor will supervise all Indian Bureau operations in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, and Michigan.

"Through the years, Paul Winsor has demonstrated great ability," Commissioner of Indian Affairs Philleo Nash said. “His work has received wide acclaim from the Indian people he serves."

A native of Oneida, Kansas, and a World War II veteran, Winsor received his 'bachelor of arts degree in education administration from Whittier College, Whittier, California, in 1950.

Appointment of Clyde W. Pensoneau as superintendent of the Hopi Agency, Keams Canyon, Arizona, was announced today by Commissioner of Indian Affairs Philleo Nash. The assignment is a recall for Pensoneau, who served as superintendent at Hopi from 1954 to 1956. Increasing economic development and education activities on the Hopi Reservation "demand a superintendent with intimate knowledge of Hopi affairs," Nash said.

The new appointee will take over January 3, 1965, succeeding Herman O'Harra, "who is retiring after 33 years of Federal service.

Pensoneau has been assistant director of the Bureau's Gallup Area Office in New Mexico since September 1962. He has had over 20 years of experience with the Bureau in extension and credit work.

He joined the Bureau in 1941 as a farm aide at Uintah and Ouray Agency in Utah and was promoted to farm agent a year later. In 1944, he transferred to the Nevada Agency, as principal agricultural aide and after a year was named farm management supervisor at the Pyramid Lake Sub agency, Nevada. In 1948, he was given supervision of extension and credit work at Fort Berthold Agency, North Dakota, and remained in that position until he transferred to Colorado River Agency, Arizona, in 1952. Two years later, he was named superintendent of the Hopi Agency. He transferred to the Central Office in Washington as agricultural extension supervisor in 1956, and later became supervisory finance specialist in the Bureau's branch of credit.

Born in Jones, Oklahoma, in 1914, Pensoneau is an enrolled member of the Kickapoo Tribe. He graduated from Oklahoma A &M College in 1941 with a degree in animal husbandry.