The Shakopee Mdewankanton Sioux Community

http://www.shakopeedakota.org/index.php

The Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux (Dakota) Community is a federally recognised Indian tribe formally organised under federal reservation status in 1969. On their website they state that they view themselves as a sovereign nation, stewards of the land, good employers and good neighbours. Tribal members are direct lineal descendants of Mdewakanton Dakota people who resided in villages near the banks of the lower Minnesota River. As of the 2010 census, 658 people currently live on the reservation or trust land. The reason I chose this  tribe is because in recent years their have been several reports about this tribes wealth. The Shakopee Mdewakanton tribe has been labelled the richest Native American tribe in America, having grossed over 1.4 billion dollars in recent years. An article done by Daily Mail recently revealed that up to 98% of tribal members are unemployed, purely by choice as last year almost every member earned up to 1 million dollars. This income is mainly generated from several businesses that the tribe owns two of these being the Mystic Lake Casino Hotel and Little Six Casino. I guess the reason that I found this tribe so interesting is because they are so wealthy since it is a well known fact that many Native American tribes that live on reservations are not wealthy and they suffer from relatively large unemployment rates. 

 The history of the tribe is the complete opposite to its current standing when white settlers arrived in the 1800s, the Dakota people (Shakopee Mdewakanton) were unaware of the concept of selling land to the newcomers; they only thought they were giving other people permission to live there. The era of settlement in Minnesota – also an era of treaties – diminished the Dakota’s homeland and way of life. With less ability to provide for themselves, the Dakota were forced to increasingly depend on the federal government’s promises and provisions. The federal government’s failure to deliver on these promises brought near-starvation and growing anger among the Dakota, resulting in the US-Dakota war of 1862.The Dakota lost the war, and the largest mass execution in United States history followed: 38 Dakota men were hanged in Minnesota, on December 26, 1862. The remaining Dakota were forced to walk more than 100 miles to Fort Snelling, where they were held in a concentration camp through the winter. In 1863 Congress rescinded all treaties with the Dakota and ordered their removal from Minnesota. For several hundred years the Dakota people lived in poverty and hardship.It was not until the late 1960s that the federal government recognised the tribe and granted them land, this ended up turning around the tribes fortune as in the early 1980s the tribe established its first casino. Overall the way I which the tribe has embraced western culture and used their heritage to better their lives is interesting.