Page images
PDF
EPUB

Information Relating to the National Park System June 30, 1945—Continued

[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]

URING the fiscal year 1945, under difficult conditions occasioned

by the war, the Office of Indian Affairs has continued to serve its dominant purpose-to protect the interests of 400,000 Indians and Eskimos in the United States and Alaska, and to aid them in becoming economically independent.

While there have been losses and costly postponements, there have been significant gains also. Owing to servicemen's allotments, to the increased quantity and value of their agricultural products, and to the wages earned by more than 40,000 Indians who have left their reservations to work in various industries, the total income of Indians has been greater than ever before. The acquaintance with a wider world and a higher standard of living acquired by many of the home folk, together with a more alert awareness and increased self-confidence of 25,000 young men and women returning from the armed services, may well prove a powerful stimulus to Indian progress.

A fundamental problem, however, is accentuated by this situation. Even with the most efficient use, Indian resources in some areas are far from sufficient to provide a decent livelihood for all Indians. A portion of the 65,000 who left their homes to fight and work, and who are now returning, can find opportunity on their reservations; but thousands cannot, and thousands of others who remained at home are in the same predicament. Since Indian resources cannot be sufficiently augmented to support the population, which is increasing rapidly, many thousands of Indians must be helped to find economic opportunity and acceptance in the general national economy.

So long as thousands of Indians exist below the subsistence level on poverty-stricken reservations, so long as employment opportunities are scarce, Federal expenditures for program services to Indians cannot be appreciably decreased.

1 John Collier served as Commissioner of Indian Affairs until March 1945. William A. Brophy was appointed Commissioner and appointment was confirmed by the Senate the same month.

233

PHYSICAL RESOURCES

LAND

The Office of Indian Affairs has jurisdiction over more than 56,000,000 acres of land. Of this total, about 7,000,000 acres are classified as agricultural, with a valuation of $90,000,000; forest lands aggregating more than 16,000,000 acres, are worth, including the standing timber, approximately $170,000,000; open grazing lands, constituting some 32,000,000 acres, are valued at approximately $90,000,000. The homes and farm buildings on these lands are so poor, in general, that their value may be assessed at no more than $15,000,000.

Acquisition and Consolidation

As the land base on most reservations is inadequate for the support of the entire population, and much of it is rendered almost useless to Indians by the fractionating process of inheritance, the Indian Service, insofar as possible, has continued its program of land acquisition and consolidation.

During the past fiscal year 157,000 acres of land, formerly opened for settlement but unclaimed, were restored to the Red Lake Reservation in Minnesota, and 12,767 acres were returned to tribal ownership on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming. In all, 257,000 acres of land were restored to Indian use.

Many tribes have been giving serious attention to the matter of providing land for their returning soldiers, and to this end tribal funds totaling $177,000 were used last year in purchasing 63,000 acres on 12 reservations, some of the acquired land being from Indian estates complicated by heirship. With their own funds the Southern Utes reacquired 40,546 acres at a cost of $83,000. During the year 10 tribes requested authorization to use $250,000 of their funds for the purchase of complicated heirship tracts and lands formerly owned by Indians.

Progress is also being made in the rearrangement of land holdings through the exchange of heirship interests for the right to use tribal lands. For example, on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota individuals have returned 21,000 acres of their allotted and inherited lands to tribal ownership in exchange for certificates of interest in the Rosebud Tribal Land Enterprise. By this means members may acquire workable farming and grazing urits in exchange for scattered fractional interests. The Enterprise is now managing 38,000 acres of allotted and tribal land, and more than 400 proposed exchanges are awaiting the availability of personnel to complete the transactions.

On Cheyenne River Reservation in South Dakota, the tribe is encouraging its members to convey their lands to tribal ownership

in exchange for assignments. All interest in 521 allotments and the undivided heirship interest in 246 allotments were thus conveyed during the past year, and 450 exchange assignments were issued. As a result, many members of the tribe have been enabled to engage in, or to enlarge, farm and livestock operations.

The marked success of this exchange procedure on these reservations reflects the Indians' own understanding of their land-use difficulties; and their efforts to solve their land-tenure problem are being closely watched by other tribes.

Oil and Minerals

Since Oklahoma's first commercial oil well, on Cherokee Indian land, came into production 48 years ago, the restricted lands of the Five Civilized Tribes have produced 459,810,138 barrels of oil, in addition to tremendous quantities of associated dry gas and casinghead gas. In the same time oil lands of the Osage Reservation have yielded 584,347,797 barrels.

The depletion of petroleum resources in Oklahoma is only partially offset by discoveries in other areas, notably on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming, which produced 2,457,251 barrels in the fiscal year 1945, and on the Blackfeet Reservation in Montana, which yielded 2,028,019 barrels.

The total output of all Indian oil wells during the year exceeded 23,000,000 barrels. There are now 11,400 oil wells on restricted Indian lands, and 6,500 oil and gas leases are in force, covering 1,700,000 acres and involving Indians of 35 tribes in 10 states. Fortyfive lease sales were held during the past fiscal year, and more than 1,000 leases were sold.

During the war period, lead and zinc held a high place in the list of strategic minerals, and the mines on restricted Quapaw lands produced some 415,000 tons of lead and zinc concentrates, valued at over $38,000,000. In order to produce this amount of concentrates in a short period of time it was necessary to deplete reserves that would not normally have been mined at such an accelerated rate. At the end of the fiscal year there were 56 lead and zinc leases in force, covering 5,726.59 acres. Production for the year amounted to 78,248 tons of lead and zinc concentrates, which was 23.9 per cent of the production from the Tri-State district.

Forest and Grazing Lands

It is conservatively estimated that there are 35,000,000,000 feet of standing timber on 16,700,000 acres of Indian lands located in 19 States, approximately 80 percent being considered suitable for lumber. This constitutes about 2 percent of the estimated total volume of standing timber in the United States.

« PreviousContinue »