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<P><SPAN class="detailheadline style9"><FONT color=#0000ff>Additions --
Dominic Meyers dropped out of the project and was replaced by UM sophomore
anthropology student Glenn Still Smoking (Blackfeet). This is a
project with the National Museum of Natural History at the
Smithsonian. </FONT></SPAN></P>
<P><SPAN class="detailheadline style9"><STRONG></STRONG></SPAN> </P>
<P><FONT size=3><SPAN class="detailheadline style9"><STRONG>Students to bring
Native history home</STRONG></SPAN><BR></FONT><SPAN class=detailbyline><EM>By
BETSY COHEN of the Missoulian</EM></SPAN></P>
<P><SPAN class=detailbyline><EM>June 1, 2008</EM></SPAN></P>
<DIV #id="photo_block"><SPAN class=detailstory>Five University of Montana
graduate students leave Sunday for the nation's capital on a mission to reclaim
the history of Montana's tribes.<BR><BR>Officially, they're called “Visiting
Native American Scholars” and they will be employed for the month of June by the
Smithsonian to copy all documentary materials related to Indians and tribes in
Montana and to bring back the information for UM's Mansfield Library.<BR><BR>The
project is a multi-year effort to make the nation's archival treasures available
to all Montanans, said David Beck, a UM Native American Studies professor who
helped arrange and secure the prestigious project.</SPAN></DIV>
<DIV id=story>
<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=3 align=right border=0>
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<TD align=middle><FONT size=2></FONT><A
href="http://adsys.townnews.com/c12140865/creative/missoulian.com/news+local+middle.2/109931-1208892699.gif?r=http://www.goodfoodstore.com"
target=_blank></A></TD></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE><SPAN class=detailstory>To
compensate the students for their time, each of them receives an $1,800 stipend,
a plane ticket and will live in housing at George Washington
University.<BR><BR>“It is such a great honor to be part of something so
revolutionary,” said UM student Wilena Old Person. “I am very excited about this
opportunity, and I am so excited to see all the stuff that is out
there.”<BR><BR>“I think for us to be looking at our history to see who we are,
where we came from and where we are going is just a great honor,” said Old
Person, who is the granddaughter of Blackfeet Chief Earl Old Person.<BR><BR>The
other students who will embark on this historic journey are Dominic Meyers, who
is of Crow and Chippewa-Cree descent; Eli Suzukovich, who is Cree; Helen Cryer,
who is Cree; and Miranda McCarvel.<BR><BR>Old Person said she is particularly
excited to be part of McCarvel's findings because McCarvel is a linguist who is
hoping to track down early audio recordings of native speakers.<BR><BR>“I know
there is a ton of Blackfeet stuff in the archives, and language is one of the
most important parts of who we are,” Old Person said. “It ties us to our
ancestors. So I am excited to see what she finds and what the Smithsonian
has.”<BR><BR>The project will take several years to complete and this first
venture is very much a “reconnaissance,” Beck said.<BR><BR>“This first summer is
really to get us going, get an assessment as much as anything and get a sense of
the materials we will need to copy,” he said. “We will use this summer to see
how we can do that the best, how to be the most efficient and not only get the
materials up on the Web but how to make them searchable.”<BR><BR>The project is
a colossal treasure hunt, and the students will likely uncover long-buried,
critical tribal knowledge, Beck said.<BR><BR>He knows for certain the famous
archive houses rare field notes produced by John Ewers, one of the nation's
foremost scholars of the Plains Indians and the history of the West. Ewers wrote
the book “The Blackfeet” in the late 1950s, which is still considered one of the
most detailed accounts of the Montana tribe, Beck said.<BR><BR>It is in
documents such as Ewers' field notes, diaries, letters and other primary source
documents where nuggets of new knowledge sleep - information that never made it
into published or public works that can help provide the rich details of tribal
eras long gone, Beck said.<BR><BR>“The work these students will do will focus on
all the tribes in the state,” Beck said. “But, we may go beyond the
state.”<BR><BR>For certain, the information will be captured through digital
technology and made available to Montana's tribes, tribal colleges, and anyone
else who is interested in the findings.<BR><BR>“The documents we collect will be
the kind people use in research,” Beck said. “Instead of having to go to
Washington, D.C., to see these documents, researchers can access them through
their computer.<BR><BR>“People will be able to study tribal culture and history
from a document perspective with much greater depth without having to travel
across the country.”<BR><BR>To have such a democratic method of information
dispersal is stunning and amazing, Beck said. Because of it, countless doors
will open for students, professors, researchers and anyone else on a quest to
plumb the depths of Montana's Indian heritage.<BR><BR>Old Person said she hopes
to be a part of this important project every year.<BR><BR>“Education is the way
we are going to come through this economic downfall and overcome substance abuse
on our reservations,” Old Person said. “Through our history we will be able to
see how our great-grandparents did - how they fought for their right for
education and health care.<BR><BR>“It is important to bring this knowledge back
so we can study it,” she said. “We find strength from our history.”</SPAN>
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