He started in 1878 and finished in 1879. The house is celebrating its 136 anniversary this year. When they deemed it was going to be a permanent fort, part of the rule was they would start to build the homes the buildings would be brick rather than wooden structures. This was the first brick structure built on the fort, and after that they were built along the same type of victorian italianate style. One of the things the fort is known for is holding Standing Bear during the Standing Bear trial he was held here at the fort. Hugh Standing Bear was from a small trial, north of where we are now. They had been there for generations. During a treaty that the americans actually more with the sioux, their homeland was given away by mistake and they were forced to move to oklahoma. And the original promise was, if you like it, we know you will like it, but if you like it, you go down there, that if you dont like it, you can come back, of course. They got down there and hated it. It was hot. The land was foreign to what they were used to. They said, we want to go back. They said, you cant. Eventually the whole tribe made it to oklahoma indian territory of the time, what is oklahoma now. Many died along the way. In fact, one of Standing Bears daughters died. Shortly after they were there, his son passed away and it was his sons dying wish that he the buried in the land of his father, so his father with a small group traveled mostly by night on foot, made all the way up to north of where we are now in fort omaha to the reservations north of where we are now, and it was there that they were finally caught by the army and the army demanded that theyd be sent back to oklahoma and this is where general crook enters the picture. General crook served in the civil war. He was captured just before the end of the war. He really made his fame in the indian wars. He fought against geronimo, he fought against crazy horse at the velvet rosebud. Over time, he actually started his career in the pacific northwest, so he fought over several decades. And over time, he became sympathetic to the native americans and started to ensure as much as possible the treaties made were actually honored. He was interested in native american culture. He was interested in their history, their religion. Over time, i think he became interested in them and did not think of them as less than human, as his contemporaries did. I know it sounds ridiculous. I think he saw they had families who love their children, love their husbands and wives, and he felt that they were treated very poorly. He wanted to do what they could to make sure they were treated honorably. He was asked to take them to oklahoma with no delay. He felt that this was an injustice. He recruited a friend of his working for the omaha herald at the time and said, this is the story, told the story and said i want you to rally support and i want you to sue me. The end result was, a trial was held to determine whether Standing Bear and his people would move back to oklahoma. What happened was, the 14th amendment had been passed, not too, too long before this. They had a couple lawyers, webster and poppleton, to be Standing Bears lawyers. And they said they would use the 14th amendment. You can be established as a person you have certain citizenship rights. Native americans, as strange as it sounds to us, were not considered persons under the law. They had to get the idea that native americans were persons and had certain rights, that the upshot of the trial was, the judge decided that he was a person under the law and had certain rights and could not be moved. The irony, of course, if this had held true for native americans all over the country all of these people on reservations would have been able to go back where they came from. There would have been mass chaos, so he limited the ruling to Standing Bear and his 20 or so followers. They use the weapons that were available to them. They had never been a warlike people anyway. And the only really i think the reason it worked was because they use the white mans own weapons against him. They used the rule of law against him. If the white man word to refute their own law, it would have been almost a selfinflicted wound. It was very clever by webster and poppleton to use the white mans rules to get justice for the red man. After the trial, after the ruling hundred through the courts as some would say , Standing Bear and his interpreter along with thomas to post traveled across the country and it was a fundraiser, really. They would speak. They would charge admission. They would raise money to try to hire lawyers to make this decision affect a lot more than just a small group it affected. To try to change laws for native american rights. There were several the poet longfellow became a follower and a sympathizer. And in fact, in his famous poem hiawatha, he said, i see many minnehaha. she was the virtual representation. So the end result, again, or ironically, one of the end results was that it was well intentioned, he was a senator who created this bill, but what it did was it was intended to provide citizenship for native americans. Each native american would be given 160 acres. If they proved they worked it, they would he come citizens. What happened is that these lands were held by the tribe were then broken into 160 acre parcels. There were some parcels that were not claimed and white settlers came in and took those, or they would buy the 160 acres from the native americans from a very reduced price, and the reservations were gutted because of the act. While the intention might have been good, the result was horrific, it was disastrous. Just another further irony of this attempt to gain equal rights for native americans was misused and abused and resulted in perpetuation of their inferior status as opposed to what it was intended to do. People go back and look and say that this was incredible to do that the court went and said that a native american was a person. We look back at we go, how could that be . How could people not see this . Yet, there was also an error made in such a significant ruling that it changed everything. It did not. Native americans finally gained this in 1924. White males had it first, it was followed by africanamerican males, then it was finally white and it was finally women, and finally it was native americans. All those years before they were given citizenship rights. Find out where the cspan cities tours going next. Youre watching American History tv, all weekend, every weekend on cspan3 a. Of next week traveled to philadelphia to learn about the museum of the american revolution, located two blocks from independence hall. The museum is scheduled to open in 2017. An incredible experience awaits every visitor who walks into this museum. They are going to see amazing artifacts, original witnesses to the american revolution, the men and women who achieved it. At the same time they are going to be experiencing the war and the era and utterly surprising and novel ways. There will be immersive environments and there will be films that bring the story to life energy will meet the people and you will really get to understand the importance of the revolution. Where the drive came from to sustain this country through eight years of warfare. Why the ideals of liberty, equality, of selfgovernance were so important. Where these valleys came from. The finalists as americans today. The collection has really been put together over the last century. It started with the acquisition of the tent that caused that housed george washington. We will very carefully revealed part of the wall of the tent. What you are seeing, this is an image that is showing the way the tent will actually displayed in the museum. It will be in an object theater it will be in its own climate controlled case, not unlike starspangled Banner Museum of American History. The tent is composed of a roof and a sidewall that haynes from the roof that hangs from the roof. In a lot of ways it is a very contemporary style of tent. What you are seeing laid out here is the linen wall of that tend. This is what was known as a soft cloth. This is the bottom of the wall that hangs down. That would fall to the inside of the tent to try to keep raymond dirt and critters from coming inside the tent very easily. Then there would have been a line of little iron hooks and eyes along the top of that wall. As you can see, it is braked a little bit, or has a right because the end of the tent where the door was located actually rises up a little bit. One of the things we saw in our original sus of the tent, when it was originally constructed, the doors were six inches lower and early in the process they had been cut and additional material added to raise a a little bit. We think about washington being about six foot to and just six foot two inches, his hat maybe got knocked off one too many times, and he sent it back for repairs. There is tremendous information that can come from the examining these old objects centuries after they were produced. It is still revealing a lot of secrets as we continue our work. On january 26 president Woodrow Wilson signed the Rocky Mountain National Park act creating a park which 100 years later spans 415 square miles in northcentral colorado and up next we examined the creation of the 10th National Park and this event, marking the Centennial Park is a little over an hour
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