This episode dives into one of the most misguided social experiments in U.S. history — the Dawes Act of 1887. Meant to "civilize" Native Americans by dividing tribal land into private plots, it instead fractured communities and stripped millions of acres from Native nations. Listeners will follow how boarding schools, Christian missions, and federal policies tried to erase Indigenous cultures in the name of progress. Behind the rhetoric of reform lay a harsh truth: assimilation often meant destruction. Yet, within these dark decades, Native people preserved languages, traditions, and resilience that would one day fuel a cultural revival.
