Nowadays we call it South Alliance: The early history of a Lakota community

Abstract

This thesis focuses on the history of a group of Lakota people who moved from the Pine Ridge and Rosebud reservations in South Dakota to Alliance, a small railroad and agricultural town in the Nebraska panhandle between the 1940s and 1960s. This study addresses a gap in the research about Indian peoples in this century by virtue of its focus on a small off-reservation community. It examines the part Indians played in the local economy and explores the inter-racial dynamics affecting that role. Class and social distinctions structured Alliance's community life. Attention to key factors--federal Indian policy, military presence, labor patterns, law enforcement, corporations, railroad employment policies, and establishment of the Indian Social Center in 1949 by the United Church Women--illustrates how class and race affected Alliance's citizens. Narratives were collected from twelve residents in order to bring personal voices to the work.