Taking Charge, Making Change

Native People and the Transition of Education from Stephan Mission to Crow Creek Tribal School

Robert W. Galler

• Publisher: University of Nebraska Press
• Year: 2025
• eBook ISBN: 9781496242044
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Native American Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

Taking Charge, Making Change gives voice to generations of Native people—from Crow Creek, Lower Brule, and other reservations in North Dakota and South Dakota—who shaped a school originally designed to foster Catholicism and assimilation. Local initiatives and collaboration transformed the Catholic Stephan Mission boarding school into the Crow Creek Tribal School, which now features both tribal traditions and American educational programs.

Through archival research and interviews with parents, graduates, teachers, and staff at Crow Creek and the surrounding community, Robert W. Galler Jr. places Native students at the heart of the narrative, demonstrating multifaceted family connections at a nineteenth-century, on-reservation religious school that evolved into a tribally run institution in the 1970s. He shows numerous ways that community members worked with Catholic leaders and ultimately transformed their mindsets and educational approaches over nearly a century. While recognizing the many challenges and tragedies that Native students endured, Galler highlights the creativity, collaborations, and contributions of the students and graduates to their communities.

Taking Charge, Making Change shows how individuals and families helped to found the school, maintain enrollment, secure funding, and influence school policies. Its graduates went on to serve with distinction in the U.S. military, earn advanced degrees after college, join and lead tribal councils in North and South Dakota, help their communities push back against federal policies, and continue to run their own education system.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• List of Tables
• Acknowledgments
• Author’s Note on Terminology
• Introduction
• 1. Adapting to New Environments and People
• 2. Cultivating Catholic Alliances
• 3. Founding a Catholic Mission School
• 4. Establishing Seasonal Rhythms
• 5. Balancing Church, State, and Tribal Interests
• 6. Confronting Internal and External Challenges
• 7. Building and Rebuilding
• 8. Responding to World War I, the Global Pandemic, and the 1920s
• 9. Surviving the Great Depression
• 10. Contributing to World War II
• 11. Leading a New Generation
• 12. Promoting Collaboration and Growth
• 13. Sacrificing for Country and Communities
• 14. Moving toward Self-Determination
• 15. Advancing from Catholic Mission to Tribal School
• Epilogue
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index
• About Robert W. Galler Jr.
• Series List