The Otoe Reservation was a twenty-four square-mile section straddling the Kansas-Nebraska state line. The majority of the reservation sat in modern-day southeast Jefferson County, Nebraska.
As early as 1834, the Oto relinquished land to the government in fulfillment of a treaty. It extended two miles (3 km) south of the state line its full length, into Washington and Marshall counties, Kansas. In Nebraska it extended into Jefferson County, which was earlier called Jones County, and Gage County. Altogether it comprised 250 sections totaling 160,000 acres (650 km2). [1] The Glenwood, Paddock, Liberty Township and Barneston Townships are wholly within the historic boundaries of the reservation. It also included sections of the Elm, Sicily, Wymore, and Island Grove Townships. [2]
Although the Oto were originally located throughout southeastern Nebraska, their main town was once located along the Platte River near present-day Plattsmouth in the eastern part of the state. The Moses Merrill Mission was located in this area. When the Nebraska Territory was formed in 1854, the Oto resigned their remaining land claim with the exception of a section near the Big Blue River. This became the Otoe Reservation.
In 1879, a new treaty with the federal government gave it the legal control to allow the Otoe to sell the reservation for tribal annuities, and relocate to "Indian country", Oklahoma. In the fall of 1882, the rest of the tribe moved to Red Rock, Oklahoma, the reservation was disbanded, and the "undeveloped" land was put for sale. The few remaining Otoes were of mixed background and quickly integrated with the new settlers, most notably the Barnes's of French and Otoe background. [3]
On May 31, 1883, 50,000 acres (200 km2) of the Oto and Missouri Indian Reservation in Kansas and Nebraska were opened for settlement at a public sale. When the Oto were removed, the southeast corner of Jefferson County was opened to settlement and the community of Diller was formed. [4]
In 1886 the tribe shared an agent with several other local tribes, including the Ponca and Pawnee. The agency was located on the Oto Reservation. [5] The present-day town of Barneston was settled at the site of one of the largest Oto villages through the 19th century. The Indian agency and a trading post were located there. Barneston was founded by a French fur trapper who married to an Oto woman. [6]
The Missouria or Missouri are a Native American tribe that originated in the Great Lakes region of what is now the United States before European contact. The tribe belongs to the Chiwere division of the Siouan language family, together with the Ho-Chunk, Winnebago, Iowa, and Otoe.
Indian Territory and the Indian Territories are terms that generally described an evolving land area set aside by the United States government for the relocation of Native Americans who held original Indian title to their land as an independent nation-state. The concept of an Indian territory was an outcome of the U.S. federal government's 18th- and 19th-century policy of Indian removal. After the American Civil War (1861–1865), the policy of the U.S. government was one of assimilation.
Montgomery County is a county located in Southeast Kansas. Its county seat is Independence, and its most populous city is Coffeyville. As of the 2020 census, the county population was 31,486. The county was named after Richard Montgomery, a major general during the American Revolutionary War.
Gage County is a county in the U.S. state of Nebraska. As of the 2020 United States Census, the population was 21,704. Its county seat is Beatrice. The county was created in 1855 and organized in 1857. It was formed from land taken from the Otoe in an 1854 treaty. The county was named for William D. Gage, a Methodist minister who served as the first chaplain of the Nebraska Territorial Legislature.
Washington County is a county located in the U.S. state of Kansas. Its county seat and largest city is Washington. As of the 2020 census, the county population was 5,530. The county was named for George Washington, the 1st president of the United States.
The Iowa, also known as Ioway, and the Bah-Kho-Je or Báxoje, are a Native American Siouan people. Today, they are enrolled in either of two federally recognized tribes, the Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma and the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska.
The L'Anse Indian Reservation is the land base of the federally recognized Keweenaw Bay Indian Community of the historic Lake Superior Band of Chippewa Indians.. The reservation is located primarily in two non-contiguous sections on either side of the Keweenaw Bay in Baraga County in the Upper Peninsula of the U.S. state of Michigan. The Keweenaw Bay Community also manages the separate Ontonagon Indian Reservation.
The Otoe are a Native American people of the Midwestern United States. The Otoe language, Chiwere, is part of the Siouan family and closely related to that of the related Iowa, Missouria, and Ho-Chunk tribes.
The Otoe–Missouria Tribe of Indians is a federally recognized tribe, located in Oklahoma. The tribe is made up of Otoe and Missouria peoples. Their language, the Chiwere language, is part of the Siouan language family.
The timeline of Kansas details past events that happened in what is present day Kansas. Located on the eastern edge of the Great Plains, the U.S. state of Kansas was the home of sedentary agrarian and hunter-gatherer Native American societies, many of whom hunted American bison. The region first appears in western history in the 16th century at the time of the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire, when Spanish conquistadors explored the unknown land now known as Kansas. It was later explored by French fur trappers who traded with the Native Americans. It became part of the United States in the Louisiana Purchase of 1803. In the 19th century, the first American explorers designated the area as the "Great American Desert."
A Half-Breed Tract was a segment of land designated in the western states by the United States government in the 19th century specifically for Métis of American Indian and European or European-American ancestry, at the time commonly known as half-breeds. The government set aside such tracts in several parts of the Midwestern prairie region, including in Iowa Territory, Nebraska Territory, Kansas Territory, Minnesota Territory, and Wisconsin Territory.
Native American tribes in the U.S. state of Nebraska have been Plains Indians, descendants of succeeding cultures of indigenous peoples who have occupied the area for thousands of years. More than 15 historic tribes have been identified as having lived in, hunted in, or otherwise occupied territory within the current state boundaries.
The Nemaha Half-Breed Reservation was established by the Fourth Treaty of Prairie du Chien of 1830, which set aside a tract of land for the mixed-ancestry descendants of French-Canadian trappers and women of the Oto, Iowa, and Omaha, as well as the Yankton and Santee Sioux tribes.
The Omaha Reservation of the federally recognized Omaha tribe is located mostly in Thurston County, Nebraska, with sections in neighboring Cuming and Burt counties, in addition to Monona County in Iowa. As of the 2020 federal census, the reservation population was 4,526. The tribal seat of government is in Macy. The villages of Rosalie, Pender and Walthill are located within reservation boundaries, as is the northernmost part of Bancroft. Due to land sales in the area since the reservation was established, Pender has disputed tribal jurisdiction over it, to which the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in 2016 that "the disputed land is within the reservation’s boundaries."
The Ponca Reservation of the Ponca Tribe of Nebraska is located in northeast Nebraska, with the seat of tribal government located in Niobrara, Knox County. The Indian reservation is also the location of the historic Ponca Fort called Nanza. The Ponca tribe does not actually have a reservation because the state of Nebraska will not allow them to have one. However, they do in fact have a 15-county service delivery area, including counties spread throughout Nebraska, South Dakota and Iowa.
The Winnebago Reservation of the Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska is located in Thurston County, Nebraska, United States. The tribal council offices are located in the town of Winnebago. The villages of Emerson, south of First Street, as well as Thurston, are also located on the reservation. The reservation occupies northern Thurston County, Nebraska, as well as southeastern Dixon County and Woodbury County, Iowa, and a small plot of off-reservation land of southern Craig Township in Burt County, Nebraska. The other federally recognized Winnebago tribe is the Ho-Chunk Nation of Wisconsin.
The Iowa Reservation of the Iowa Tribe of Kansas and Nebraska straddles the borders of southeast Richardson County in southeastern Nebraska and Brown and Doniphan counties in northeastern Kansas. Tribal headquarters are west of White Cloud, Kansas. The reservation was defined in a treaty from March 1861. As of 2023, the tribe operates Casino White Cloud on the reservation.
Meskwakiinaki, also called the Meskwaki Settlement, is an unincorporated community in Tama County, Iowa, United States, west of Tama. It encompasses the lands of the Meskwaki Nation, one of three Sac and Fox tribes in the United States. The others are located in Oklahoma and Kansas. The settlement is located in the historic territory of the Meskwaki (Fox), an Algonquian people. Meskwaki people established the settlement in 1857 by privately repurchasing a small part of the land they had lost in the Sac and Fox treaty of 1842.
The Cherokee Commission, was a three-person bi-partisan body created by President Benjamin Harrison to operate under the direction of the Secretary of the Interior, as empowered by Section 14 of the Indian Appropriations Act of March 2, 1889. Section 15 of the same Act empowered the President to open land for settlement. The Commission's purpose was to legally acquire land occupied by the Cherokee Nation and other tribes in the Oklahoma Territory for non-indigenous homestead acreage.
