Rocky Boy Reservation: A Story of Tribal Tenacity

Officially, it's called Rocky Boy's Reservation, but to many of its residents, it is simply Rocky Boy. The same holds true for the mountains that take up one third of the land within the reservation boundaries. Signs and historians call them the Bears Paw Mountains, others say Bear Paw, while many of the locals, especially those who live within them, label this assemblage of buttes and hills as the Bear Paws.

Located on the prairie just south of Havre, Rocky Boy is the smallest of all of Montana's reservations. In September 1916, via a Presidential Executive Order, Rocky Boy, with a beginning mass of 55,040 acres, became the last reservation established. Through various methods of land acquisition, today it encompasses 122,000 acres. Many folks, including artist Charlie Russell, William Bole, owner at the time of the Great Falls Tribune, Paris Gibson, founder of Great Falls and author Frank Linderman, helped with the effort to increase the Tribe's land.

Initially, the reserve took its title from a Chippewa Chief whose name translated as "Stone Child." However, a white misinterpretation of the name rendered it as Rocky Boy instead. For whatever reason the name stuck.

At one time, the Chippewa, having migrated west from the Great Lakes region, were separate from the Cree, who moved south to Montana from Canada. Historical notes show the Chippewa probably didn't get to Montana until about 1880. The Cree were here sooner and had aligned themselves with the Assinniboine. Both peoples had guns and horses and were the dominant force on the northern Great Plains until such time as the Blackfeet also came to own rifles and acquired ponies.

The Cree being led by Chief Little Bear and the Chippewa by (Stone Child) Rocky Boy were both essentially landless. Traveling throughout Montana from a period of about 1890 to 1910, the bands maintained their way of life as nomadic people. They harvested berries, roots, and wild plants and hunted, gathered and polished bones and horns for trade. It was a happy life, but it didn't fit in with the white man's desire to get rid of them.

Overall, the story of Montana's Native People is a depressing one. But the Chippewa and Cree received the worst treatment in terms of being able to establish a homeland base. Proposals to carve out reservations were rejected. Many misguided Montanans wanted to send both tribes to Canada. In 1915, a part of Fort Assinniboine, a large military reservation near Havre, was set aside for the two tribes. The residents of Havre approached the Chippewa Cree and proposed creating a park between the town and the reservation. In exchange for the Rocky Boy's support in obtaining the land, the town would aid the reservation in future land acquisition. The result is the 9,000-acre Beaver Creek Park; the second largest city park in the United States.

Chief Rocky Boy passed away in 1916. As a tribute for the major role he played in achieving a home for the Cree and Chipewa, it was given his name.

The establishment of Rocky Boy's hardly solved the tribe's problems. Not only was the land mass was too small to support the members, the terrain was dry and not very productive. The Indians had little or no housing, no schooling and were poorly fed. Overall, a bad attitude existed within the U.S. Government and with others over the plight of the Chippewa and Cree people. Professor Thomas Wessel of Montana State University stated, "The Government has wrongly treated Rocky Boy's as an outdoor asylum for social deviants, who hopefully someday would assimilate into the western world. The Bureau of Indian Affairs, charged with overseeing reservations refused to look at the Rocky Boy's as a community or as an economic entity, and allow the reservation to drift without definition or direction."

It took a great deal of effort by those who came after chiefs Rocky Boy and Little Bear to make the reservation as strong as it is today. Their insistences on pursuing increased land attainment, helped make the reservation more viable.

Rock Boy's now has self-governance status, which allows it to avoid dealing with the BIA and work directly with the Federal Government, a far more beneficial situation.

Up until the last 20 years or so, Rocky Boy's was thought to be void of natural resources save scenery. Recently, the tribe has been successful in finding and negotiating the drilling of natural gas on the reservation. Agriculture though is their dominant source of income. All of the land is tribal owned, but individuals farm or ranch various parcels, and there is some leased land.

Several small businesses operate on the reservation; some owned by the tribe, others by individuals. Competition for any business would come from nearby Havre or Great Falls to the south. Bear Paw Ski Bowl, on 6,916-foot Mount Baldy, is owned by the tribe and operated by an organization out of Havre. Another large tribal business is the Dry Fork Farm, an irrigated haying operation. Thanks in part to an emphasis on wildlife enhancement, numbers of deer, elk and antelope have increased significantly on the reservation.

Of the more than 6,000 registered Chippewa Cree Tribal members, about 3,400 live on the reservation where the Cree is language still preserved. Stone Child College, with an average enrollment of about 250 mostly tribal folks, is a shining educational light on the reservation.

The Chippewa and Cree people, like all of Montana's natives, take great pride in their history and traditions. For the Rocky Boy's tribes, their annual powwow is the highlight of the year for celebrating who they are.

We thank Eddie Stamper of the Rock Boy's country for his help in compiling this column.

Rick & Susie Graetz are from Helena. Rick is the founder of Montana Magazine They are the authors and photographers of numerous Montana books including their latest title, Montana's Yellowstone River - From the Teton Wilderness to the Missouri. Their email is thisismontana@aol.com

E-mail this story

Back to Index

Printer Friendly Version