An accumulated stockpile of “Montana, the Magazine of Western History” is invaluable. One of my most useful issues is Vol. XXII, Number One, Winter, 1972. Originally I bought it for $1.75 because it included an homage to Lone Wolf, also known as Hart Schultz, the half-Blackfeet son of James Willard Schultz. Paul Dyck, Hart Schultz’ adopted son, interweaves his comments with stories from Lone Wolf.
Doing some rearranging on my shelves, I see that there is another intriguing article in the same issue, this one by Howard L. Harrod, who wrote the definitive history of the Methodists on the Blackfeet Reservation. The article is about a nineteenth century presidential experiment with “faith-based” management of the reservation. President Grant was fed up with the constant graft, drunkenness, and incompetence of Indian agents and thought that if the churches supplied the agents, this would no longer be a problem, because all churchmen abided by the principles of Jesus Christ. Right?
The Blackfeet were arbitrarily assigned to the Methodists, though the Jesuits had been active on the reservation for decades. Who knows why? Fear of papists? Maybe Irish papists lurking across the Canadian border, disguised as Metis and waiting for their chance to invade the US? Agent Young, ordained, was sent along to “civilize and Christianize” the “savages.”
It was a policy of the US Government to put tribes who were traditional enemies on the same reservation, in hopes that they would fight each other rather than collaborating to resist their white administrators. This worked pretty well other places, but on the Blackfeet reservation the idea of sending a Methodist to supervise a people used to Catholics succeeded in pitching the white folks against each other. In a civilized and Christian manner, of course. Which meant a lot of politics and letter writing, and bitter suspicion that still persists.
Part of the problem was that when the reservation was shrunk north of Birch Creek, it left high and dry St. Peter’s Church and school, the center of Jesuit works. This meant that the clientele, which was not to leave the reservation, was separated from their teachers and St. Peter’s had no reason for existence. Undaunted, the priests came by wagon to gather students they already knew and to find new ones, which they transported on grounds that their parents wished it.
On page 49 is a photo of those students, seventeen of them, ranging from near-adult girls (possibly matrons) to a little pre-school tyke who is wiggly enough to be blurred, even though Montana’s first Catholic Bishop, John B. Brondel, is holding him by his shoulders. The next small boy over is clearly too cold -- he has bare feet and his shoulders are hunched, his hands clenched. There is only one boy with braids and a blanket. The year was 1885, so when I came in 1961, these children -- those who survived -- were the elders in Browning. They are not named in the caption. Neither are the two men with mustaches and white foreheads -- probably drivers.
Agent Young argued that these children were his wards and that his authority over them was greater than than that of their own parents, who were also wards. On page 43 is a photo of children at the Blackfeet Agency School, probably the infamous Willow Creek school just outside Browning. The boys wear small three piece suits, bandannas and round hats. All are shod. (Many dressed this way the rest of their lives.) The girls wear pinafore dresses, with many petticoats, and stand with their hands together. One wears moccasins. No one looks happy. I don’t see a year in the caption. The Agency School didn’t have enough space to accommodate all the students who were supposed to attend.
Young’s favorite thing was handing out candy on Christmas Eve, which he claimed warmed his heart, though there is no precedent in the New Testament. In fact, this is the infamous period when the buffalo disappeared and somehow so did the government commodities, so that people were starving. It is claimed that Young fed corn meant for the people to his chickens.
When he arrived on Little Badger in mid-December, 1876, where the agency was, Young did not like the location. “I don’t believe a more unsuitable place in every respect could be selected on the reservation.” Three-fourths of the tribe had gone hunting buffalo to the southeast. A few chiefs came to see their new agent, looked him over, shrugged, and went back to hunting. Young should have realized right then that he was not going to make obedient peasants of them.
The well-known and beloved “Brother Van” Van Orsdel sized up the situation and got as far away from it as he could, concentrating on the many small white communities who were open to Protestant services. The Methodist denomination sent no money, though President Grant had hoped they would. Appeals from Catholic officials to Washington, D.C., officials would be seen as reasonable, but then referred back to Young for his opinion, which ended the matter. John Imoda, S.J. tried to bring in the Montana courts through a writ of habeas corpus, but it didn’t work.
Young finally threw the Jesuits off the reservation in 1882, but Father Prando simply built a chapel in the infamous town of Robaire, across the Birch Creek boundary, where the bootleggers plied their trade. Many Indians came to attend mass: there were nearly 700 baptisms and 55 marriages.
St. Peter’s Church remains near Great Falls where it is ceremonially opened once a year for services. A much fuller account of all this back-and-forth is in Howard Harrod’s book, “Mission Among the Blackfeet.” (University of Oklahoma Press, Copyright 1971. ISBN 0-8061-1301-4) Harrod himself has passed on.
Today Methodists all along the Montana High-Line are finding their congregations shrinking, but the Catholics are booming. Maybe it’s that Blackfeet like ceremony. Maybe that original antagonism is still alive, reinforced by some political reason that is now forgotten.
Even though I’m a Unitarian-Universalist, I served the Blackfeet Methodists for one year when their normal supply channels failed. Though I preached from the conventional lectionary, I didn’t shy away from my own sort of Taoism/process theology point of view and no one had trouble with that. Many people have recognized the political component of religion -- the force that causes those who profess peace and love to act out turmoil and punishment in the pursuit of resources. “Faith-based” bureaucracy turned out not to be a very good idea, which Bush advisors would do well to notice.
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