The End of Indian KansasA Study in Cultural Revolution, 1854-1871Craig Miner and William E. Unrauxiv, 182 pages, illustrated
The forced removal of thousands of Indians from eastern Kansas between 1854 and 1871 affected more Indians and occupied more government time than the celebrated exploits of the military against the more warlike western tribes. In this volume Miner and Unrau show Kansas at midcentury to be a moral testing ground where the drama of Indian disinheritance was played out. They relate how railroad men, land speculators, and timber operations came to be firmly entrenched on Indian land in territorial Kansas. They examine remarkable incongruities in Indian policy, land policy, law, and administration, pointing to specific cases in which legal maneuvers by the federal government--within the framework of treaties, statutes, and executive pronouncements--heped to insure the pattern of tribal destruction. Separate chapters deal with internal factionalism in the Indian tribes, the practice of government chief-making, and the "Indian Ring"--the sub rosa alliances influencing the treaty or sale process. The authors also include revealing portraits of the individuals, from territorial governors to railroad officials, who helped engineer the end of Indian Kansas.
CRAIG MINER is Willard W. Garvey Distinguished Professor of Business History at Wichita State University. Among his numerous books are Kansas: The History of the Sunflower State, 1854–2000; West of Wichita: Settling the High Plains of Kansas, 1865–1890; and Harvesting the High Plains: John Kriss and the Business of Wheat Farming, 1920–1950. WILLIAM E. UNRAU, Wichita State University Endowment
Association Distinguished Research Professor of History, has
published widely in American Indian history. He is the author
of White Man's Wicked Water: The Alcohol
Trade and Prohibition in Indian Country, 1802–1892,
and Mixed-Bloods and Tribal Dissolution:
Charles Curtis and the Quest for Indian Identity. Home | About the Press | Recent Awards | Contact Us | Order
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When Kansas became a U.S. territory
in 1854 literally all of its land area was guaranteed by treaty
to Indians. More than 10,000 Kickapoos, Delawares, Sacs, Foxes,
Shawnees, Potawatomis, Kansas, Ottawas, Wyandots, and Osages,
not to mention a number of smaller tribes, inhabited Kansas.
By 1875 there were only a couple of bands left.