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Iowa tribe of oklahoma employment opportunities The Iowa Tribe of Oklahoma is the largest employer in the area with over 170 employees in many different departments including an Early Childhood Education Program, Health Programs, Tribal Gaming Commission, Public Safety, Social Services, and Vocational Rehabilitation.

The Ponca Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma, also known as the Ponca Nation, is one of two federally recognized tribes of Ponca people. The other is the Ponca Tribe of Nebraska. Traditionally, peoples of both tribes have spoken the Omaha-Ponca language, part of the Siouan language family.

Under the Department of Interior's Land Buy-Back Program for Tribal Nations, more than 1300 holders of fractional interests at this tribe were offered a total of $7 million to purchase holdings for transfer to the tribe, to increase their communal lands.

• 1Government
• 4History

Government[edit]

The Ponca Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma is headquartered in Ponca City, Oklahoma. Their tribal jurisdictional area includes parts of Kay and Noble counties. Of the 3,787 enrolled tribal members, 3000 live within the state of Oklahoma. Membership in the tribe requires a 1/8 minimum blood quantum, according to rules developed by the tribe.^[1]

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Current administration[edit]

According to their written constitution, the seven-member governing council of the Ponca Tribe, called the Business Committee, is democratically elected for four-year terms. Among these, one person is elected as chairman. Other offices include vice-chairman, and secretary/treasurer.

The current tribal administration includes:

• Doug Rhodd, Sr., Chairman^[2]
• Bennett Arkeketa, Vice-Chairman^[3]
• Paula Mendoza, Secretary/Treasurer
• Kinsel Lieb, Business Committee Member
• Carla Rhodd Carney, Business Committee Member
• Casey Camp-Horinek, Business Committee Member
• Scotty Simpson, Jr., Business Committee Member

Economic development[edit]

The Ponca Indian Tribe operates its own housing authority and issues its own tribal vehicle tags. Their tribal jurisdiction is relatively isolated and they have worked to create jobs for their people.

They developed a casino in Ponca City, their major jurisdiction. It is more than 105 miles north of Oklahoma City by car, and about 94 miles northwest of Tulsa, two major population centers. The Blue Star Gaming and Casino has ceased operations.^[4] The Ponca opened a second casino in the same location, called the Two Rivers Casino; it also went out of business in the economic downturn due to the national recession in 2008-2009. The tribe was severely affected by this. The estimated annual economic impact of the Ponca Tribe in 2011 was $1,964,321, down from $15 million in 2008,^[1] when the casino was operating.

Language and culture[edit]

In 2009 an estimated 33 tribal members spoke the Ponca language.^[5]

Since 1876 the tribe hosts an annual homecoming powwow. It takes place in August in Ponca City.^[6]

History[edit]

The Ponca tribe separated from the Omaha tribe in the early 18th century as they were migrating west from the Great Lakes region. They settled in present-day Nebraska and South Dakota. Smallpox and other introduced Eurasian diseases took a heavy toll of the tribe repeatedly in the 18th and 19th centuries, as they had no immunity to the new diseases. The more powerful Sioux, also known as the Lakota, encroached on their land base.

The Ponca never went to war with the United States. They signed their first peace treaty with the US in 1817. In the 1825 they signed a trade agreement. Treaties in 1858 and 1865 ceded lands. The 1860s and 1870s were a difficult time for the Ponca tribe, as the buffalo were disappearing, droughts destroyed crops, and warfare with the Sioux combined to threaten the Ponca with starvation.^[8]

The US did not uphold their treaty obligations to the Ponca. They gave land reserved for the Ponca to the Sioux in 1868, as part of the Great Sioux Reservation. The government relocated the Ponca to Indian Territory in 1877.^[8]

The forced removal of the Ponca to Indian Territory was mismanaged; they arrived too late to plant crops, the government failed to provide them with adequate supplies, and their assigned location had chronic malaria. An estimated 158 Ponca died during the first year: almost a third of the entire tribe. Among them was the oldest son of Standing Bear, a Ponca chief.

Standing Bear took his son's body back to Nebraska for burial in traditional lands. There he was arrested by the Army for having left the reservation, but he gained the sympathy of Brigadier General George Crook. With help from prominent attorneys working pro bono, Standing Bear filed a habeas corpus suit challenging his arrest. The US District Court judge's decision in Standing Bear v. Crook (1879) established the right of Indian people to exercise habeas corpus and their legal status as citizens under US law.^[8]

White Eagle, a principal Ponca chief, settled on a 101,000-acre (410 km²) reservation in what would later be organized as Kay and Noble counties in Oklahoma. He leased much of the land to the 101 Ranch for pasture (and later, oil development). In the 1890s missionaries and government agents tried to make the Ponca abandon their traditional tribal dances and lifeways.

In 1892, under the Dawes Allotment Act, the US government registered the members of the tribe, and allocated individual plots of land to each household. This was intended to introduce them to fee ownership and subsistence farming, as well as extinguish Indian tribal land claims in Oklahoma prior to its becoming a state. The government declared the remaining reservation land as 'surplus' and sold it to European-American settlers. This resulted in a great loss of communal land for the tribe and its descendants, and destabilized their traditional culture.

20th century to present[edit]

The discovery of oil on Ponca lands in 1911 had mixed results for the people. Some became wealthy but others were taken advantage of by speculators and quickly lost their land. Drilling and exploitation of oil, together with mining of other resources, created environmental problems for the tribe.^[8]

Peyote religion was introduced in the 1910s. In 1918, Louis MacDonald and Frank Eagle, both Ponca, co-founded the Native American Church.^[8]

After many Ponca served in World War I, returning Ponca veterans founded the American Legion chapter Buffalo Post 38. In their community they revived traditional war dances, such as the heluska dance.^[8]

Under the 1936 Oklahoma Indian Welfare Act, the tribe reorganized their government. They ratified their constitution in 1950 and became federally recognized. Tribal headquarters were established in White Eagle, located south of Ponca City.^[8]

Clyde Warrior, a Ponca, cofounded the National Indian Youth Council. He promoted self-determination and inspired many young Native activists during the 1960s and 1970s.^[8]

In the years since allocation of plots under the Dawes Act, these landholdings and interests became highly fractionated among heirs, often preventing effective use of the land and making sales difficult. In addition, the departments of Interior and Treasury were found in the late 20th century to have mismanaged the fee accounts and payments due to holders of fractionated land for drilling and mineral leases. In 2009 the US government settled a major class action suit against it brought by Elouise Cobell (Blackfeet) in 1996, known as the Cobell v. Salazar suit.

The Ponca are participating in the Department of Interior's Land Buy-Back Program for Tribal Nations, developed as part of this settlement. In August 2016, Interior officials announced that it had offered approximately $7 million in purchase offers to 'more than 1,300 landowners with fractional interests at the Ponca Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma' as part of the Land Buy-Back Program for Tribal Nations (Buy-Back Program). Recipients have 45 days to complete the transaction. This program is designed to purchase fractionated interests and transfer land back to tribes in trust, to increase their communal holdings and ability to better use the land.^[9]

Notes[edit]

1. ^ ^abc[1]Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma.. Retrieved 10 Jan 2017.
2. ^Chairman.The Official Website of the Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma. (retrieved 6 August 2009)
3. ^Vice-Chairman.The Official Website of the Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma. (retrieved 6 August 2009)
4. ^Oklahoma Indian Casinos: Casinos by Tribe.500 Nations. Retrieved 2 Jan 2011.
5. ^Anderton, Alice, PhD. Status of Indian Languages in Oklahoma.Intertribal Wordpath Society. 2009 (6 August 2009)
6. ^Ponca Nation.The Official Website of the Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma. (retrieved 6 August 2009)
7. ^'Urban Indian 5.'US Department of the Interior, Indian Arts and Crafts Board. (retrieved 15 Oct 2011)
8. ^ ^abcdefghVan de Logt, Mark. 'Ponca'Archived 2012-01-14 at the Wayback Machine, Oklahoma Historical Society's Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History & Culture. 2009 (6 August 2009)
9. ^'More than $7 Million in Buy-Back Offers Sent to Landowners with Fractional Interests at Ponca Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma', Press Release, 18 August 2016, Department of Interior; accessed 26 November 2016

External links[edit]

• Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma, official website
• 'Ponca', Oklahoma Historical Society's Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture

The Kialegee Tribal Town is a federally recognized Native American tribe in Oklahoma, as well as a traditional township within the former Muscogee Creek Confederacy in the American Southeast. Tribal members pride themselves on retaining their traditions and many still speak their traditional Muscogee language. The name 'Kialegee' comes from the Muscogee word, eka-lache, meaning 'head left.'^[2]

Government[edit]

The Kialegee Tribal Town is headquartered in Wetumka, Oklahoma. Of 700 enrolled tribal members, 629 live within the state of Oklahoma. Its tribal jurisdictional area falls Creek County, Muskogee County, Tulsa County, County, Okmulgee County, Hughes, McIntosh, Okfuskee counties.^[3] The tribe's elected mekko or chief is Jeremiah Hobia, who succeeded Tiger Hobia. The mekko's term is for two years. Tiger Hobia succeeded Jennie Lillard.^[4]

Enrollment in the tribe required an individual to be full-blood Native American: half to full-blood Muscogee Creek and up to one-half Indian of any other tribe.^[5] Documentation for enrollment follows matrilineal descent.^[6] Any descendant of a female Kialegee tribal member is automatically eligible for tribal membership. Spouses of Kialegee tribal members may petition for membership. In special circumstances, any full-blood Indian may petition the tribe for enrollment as an 'Adopted Member.'^[5]

The Kialegee Tribal Town operates its own tribal courts. It has an environmental educational program for youth, the Kialegee Tribal Town's Environmental 'Kub' Program.^[3]

Culture[edit]

Town members and visitors celebrate the annual Kialegee Nettv (Day), a gathering that celebrates the town's history and culture.^[1]

History[edit]

Kialegee emerged as an independent town from a larger Creek town, Tuckabatche,^[6] located along rivers in what is now Alabama. Kialegee in return produced two daughter towns, Hutchechuppa and Achinahutchee. Before removal, the Muscogee Confederacy included about 50 towns. As with the remainder of the Creek people, those of Kialegee had a matrilinealkinship system, with descent figured through the mother's line. Children are considered to be born into the mother's clan and receive their status from her and her people. It was an agrarian community. Women and children grew and processed a variety of crops, while men hunted for game.^[7]

On June 29, 1796 leaders from Kialegee signed a peace treaty with the new United States. But, within a decade the townspeople joined the Red Stick Upper Creeks in the Creek Civil War, in which traditionalists (Red Sticks) fought against the Lower Towns, which tended to have members who were more assimilated to European-American culture, as they had far more interaction with them. In 1813, US troops burned Kialegee. In 1814, 1818, 1825, and 1826, Kialegee representatives signed treaties with the United States. Finally 166 families of Kialegee were forced to relocate to Indian Territory in 1835 after Congress passed the Indian Removal Act.^[8]

The tribe settled south of what would become Henryetta, Oklahoma.^[6] They maintained a ceremonial ground and played stick ball against the Alabama-Quassarte Tribal Town. Their ground was put to sleep in 1912 when ethnologistJohn R. Swanton visited the town. He recorded that Kialegee was a Red Town, or community of warriors.^[1]

After the passage of the Oklahoma Indian Welfare Act in 1936, which provided for revival of self-government among the Native American tribes, the US federal government offered each of the Muscogee Creek tribal towns the opportunity to enroll as an individual tribe and establish their own government. Of more than 40 towns, only three accepted: Kialegee, Thlopthlocco, and the Alabama-Quassarte.^[6]

The tribe ratified its constitution and by-laws on June 12, 1941.^[5] The tribe is governed by a mekko or town king.^[6] Additional officers are the First Warrior, Second Warrior, Secretary, and Treasurer.^[5] The first tribal headquarters was the home of Martin Givens.^[5]

Tribal flag[edit]

The flag of the tribe contains a sky blue circle, featuring a pair of stickball sticks, used in the traditional game still played at ceremonial grounds today. The black cross at the top represents the Christian religion. To the left is a hollowed log and beater, which women used to grind corn meal, central to Muscogee diets. At the bottom is a ceremonial lodge with a rounded bark roof, sitting on a mound. This lodge was the center of the tribal town for religious and civic gatherings and also a shelter for the needy. The earthwork mound reflects the Mississippian culture heritage of modern Muscogee people and the complex mounds that culture left. The bald eagle at the right is a sacred animal, featured in many tribal stories.^[9]

Economic development[edit]

The Kialegee Etvlwv Business Committee operates a daycare, gas station, and smoke shop. Kialegee Tribal Town also operates its own housing division. In 2008, its annual tribal economic impact was $1,017,684.^[3]

In 2011 Kialegee Tribal Town was preparing land for development of a Red Clay Casino in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. The National Indian Gaming Commission was reviewing the project closely, as it was strongly opposed on the local level.^[10] The Red Clay Casino plan was halted by a legal injunction in 2012, and despite subsequent progress by the Kialegees in court, was not continued.^[11]

In 2017 further controversy broke out regarding proposed Kialegee development of a different tract of land in Broken Arrow for an Embers Grille restaurant and possible Red Creek Casino, with the Muscogee (Creek) Nation Attorney General warning the landowner about legal consequences for illegal gaming at the site, and an attorney for the Kialegee stating Muscogee interference with the project would be resisted.^[12] On August 16, 2017, the site was raided by Muscogee Lighthorse police prior to the facility's opening, and gambling equipment seized.^[11]

Notes[edit]

1. ^ ^abcClark 175
2. ^Clark 173
3. ^ ^abc2011 Oklahoma Indian Nations Pocket Pictorial Directory.Archived 2012-05-12 at the Wayback MachineOklahoma Indian Affairs Commission. 2011: 17. Retrieved 4 Jan 2012.
4. ^'Kialegee Festival, American Indian Cultural Center and Museum Newsletter. 2009 Q4.
5. ^ ^abcdeUnited States Department of the Interior Office of Indian Affairs. Constitution and By-Laws of the Kialegee Tribal Town, Oklahoma. Washington DC, 1942.
6. ^ ^abcdeMoore, John H. 'Kialegee Tribal Town.' Oklahoma Historical Society's Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History & Culture
7. ^Clark 174
8. ^Clark 174-5
9. ^Healy, Donald T., and Peter J. Orenski. Native American Flags. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2003: 112-3.
10. ^Hylton, Susan. 'Sullivan joins BA casino battle', Tulsa World, 2011. Retrieved 15 June 2018
11. ^ ^abPaighten Harkins. 'Creek Nation police raid potential casino site on tribal land in Broken Arrow, arrest property owner', 'Tulsa World,' August 16, 2017.
12. ^Paighten Harkins. 'Kialegee Tribal Town will resist Muscogee (Creek) Nation interference in possible Broken Arrow casino', 'Tulsa World,' August 8, 2017.

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References[edit]

• Clark, C. Blue. Indian Tribes of Oklahoma: A Guide. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2009. ISBN978-0-8061-4060-5.

External links[edit]

Wichita Tribe Of Ok

• Kialegee Tribal Town, Oklahoma Historical Society

The Wichita Tribe