Dakota History

In 2016, a small protest encampment at the Standing Rock Reservation in North Dakota, initially established to block construction of the Dakota Access oil pipeline, grew to be the largest Indigenous protest movement in the 21st century. Water Protectors knew this battle for native sovereignty had already been fought many times before, and that, even after the encampment was gone, their anti-colonial struggle would continue. Our History Is the Future is at once a work of history, a manifesto, and an intergenerational story of resistance.

Written by Wahpetunwan Dakota scholar and activist Waziyatawin of Pezihutazizi Otunwe, What Does Justice Look Like? offers an opportunity now and for future generations to learn the long-untold history and what it has meant for the Dakota People. On that basis, the book offers the further opportunity to explore what we can do between us as Peoples to reverse the patterns of genocide and oppression and instead to do justice with a depth of good faith, commitment, and action that would be genuinely new for Native and non-Native relations.

"With humor and lyrical grace," Kathleen Norris meditates on a place in the American landscape that is at once desolate and sublime, harsh, and forgiving, steeped in history and myth (San Francisco Chronicle). A combination of reporting and reflection, Dakota reminds us that wherever we go, we chart our own spiritual geography.

The history of the Sioux is replete with constant reminders of the consequences of both their accommodation of and resistance to American incursions into their territory by pioneering white settlers pushing further westward during the 19th century. Some Sioux leaders and their bands resisted incoming whites, while others tried to accommodate them, but the choice often had little impact on the ultimate outcome. Crazy Horse, who was never defeated in battle by U.S. troops, surrendered to them in 1877, only to be bayoneted to death by soldiers attempting to imprison him.

The unforgettable true story of a young lawyer's impossible legal battle to stop the federal government from foreclosing on thousands of family farmers.

A Sweeping History Of The Great State Of South Dakota South Dakota is a place of stark contradictions: carved presidential faces gazing out from sacred Lakota land, booming cities surrounded by emptying small towns, and a frontier mythology that obscures as much as it illuminates. In this sweeping narrative history, the Mount Rushmore State emerges not as a forgotten flyover territory but as a crucible where the central tensions of the American experience have played out with unusual clarity and force. From the Paleo-Indian hunters who stalked mammoths across the ancient prairie to the tech...

“The story of what Dakota did . . . will be told for generations.”—President Barack Obama, from remarks given at Meyer’s Medal of Honor ceremony In the fall of 2009, Taliban insurgents ambushed a patrol of Afghan soldiers and Marine advisors in a mountain village called Ganjigal. Firing...

In Blizzards, Banks, and Bakken: An Irreverent History of North Dakota, Jordan Blake Carter takes listeners on a journey across two centuries of stubborn survival. Meet the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara who built thriving river towns long before statehood. March with the populists who took over their own government in the name of fairness. Survive the Dust Bowl, the Depression, and the floods that nearly swallowed cities whole. Then stand in the glow of oil rigs and Friday-night stadium lights, watching a state still learning how to balance change with endurance.

Written by the forensic nurse who transformed the way the FBI profiles and catches serial killers, this thought-provoking book takes an intimate look at the creation of the Behavioral Science Unit–the inspiration for Hulu’s Mastermind documentary. In the 1970s, the FBI created the...

Visit the Mount Rushmore State! Learn about South Dakota's history, geography, weather, people, and more in this book that's all about our 40th state.

The northern plains are often ignored by the rest of the nation or, if not, are mentioned in the context of the weather, Mount Rushmore, or the Black Hills. However, North Dakota and South Dakota have a colorful past - and present - deserving of greater recognition. Norman K. Risjord relates the remarkable histories of these two states, from the geological formation of the Great Plains to economic changes in the 21st century.

PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST The gripping true story of a murder on an Indian reservation, and the unforgettable Arikara woman who becomes obsessed with solving it—an urgent work of literary journalism. “I don’t know a more complicated, original protagonist in literature than Lissa...

Get ready for towering monuments, stampeding bison, and hidden canyons in South Dakota: The Mount Rushmore Adventure—a captivating children’s travel story that brings the spirit of the Mount Rushmore State to life! Ideal for kids ages 6–15 and their families, this educational and heartwarming tale is part of the beloved Across the 50 States series. When the Thompson family rolls into South Dakota, they discover much more than just presidential faces carved in stone. From exploring the striking landscapes of Badlands National Park to watching bison roam free in Custer State Park, Timmy...

The Histories of Missouri, Nebraska & North Dakota In One Collected Volume From the confluence of America's greatest rivers to the windswept prairies beneath endless skies, Missouri, Nebraska, and North Dakota tell the epic story of the nation's westward expansion. In this masterful volume, Daniel Hardy traces how three distinct states shared a common destiny as thresholds between one America and another—gateways where settlement met frontier, where rivers carried dreams alongside commerce, and where the plow transformed wilderness into the world's breadbasket. Hardy illuminates the ...

An evocative and wildly absorbing novel about the Winters, a family living in New York City’s famed Dakota apartment building in the year leading up to John Lennon’s assassination. It’s the fall of 1979 in New York City when twenty-three-year-old Anton Winter, back from the Peace Corps and...

In August 1862, after decades of broken treaties, increasing hardship, and relentless encroachment on their lands, a group of Dakota warriors convened a council at the tepee of their leader, Little Crow. Knowing the strength and resilience of the young American nation, Little Crow counseled caution, but anger won the day. Forced to either lead his warriors in a war he knew they could not win or leave them to their fates, he declared, "[Little Crow] is not a coward: he will die with you."

The Histories Of Ohio, South Dakota & Wisconsin In One Collected Volume Far from the flyover country of popular imagination, the American Midwest has been a crucible where competing visions of democracy, identity, and progress have collided for centuries. In this compelling volume, Daniel Hardy examines three states that reveal the true complexity of the Midwestern experience. Ohio, the industrial powerhouse and perennial political battleground, has produced presidents and shaped national debates from abolition to labor rights to the fate of American manufacturing. South Dakota's sweeping ...

The Wild West has made legends out of many men, but it also forged a lasting legacy for a few of the West's most legendary towns, and alongside the city of Tombstone, Arizona, perhaps the most famous of them was Deadwood in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Deadwood owes its notoriety to some of the colorful people who called it home, and a recent critically acclaimed television series about the town that brought it to life for millions of modern viewers.

From a historian and senior editor at Atlas Obscura, a fascinating account of the daring nineteenth-century women who moved to South Dakota to divorce their husbands and start living on their own terms For a woman traveling without her husband in the late nineteenth century, there was only one...

In the eleventh book of the Urban Legends of the U.S.A series we head to some more creepy places to find legends and folklore from Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota and Tennessee. Inside are Native American legends and folklore from the deep woods and hills of the United States. Drive into legends about werewolves, witches, cryptids, curses, haunted roads, woods, hotels, trains, lakes, cemeteries, ships and roads. Read personal stories from locals about their encounters with the paranormal. Use the directions inside to have your own adventures hunting for legends and lore.