Oklahoma Journeys
Week of January 6, 2008
Signing of the Medicine Lodge Peace Treaty 1867
A monumental meeting at Medicine Lodge makes the headlines. As white settlers encroached onto the territory of the large plains tribes - the Cheyenne, Arapaho, Kiowas, Comanches, and Plains Apaches - no small amount of friction and conflict occurred. A peace council attended by thousands of Native Americans attempted to bring peace to the area, and that’s the topic of this week’s Oklahoma Journeys from the Oklahoma Historical Society.
From the Oklahoma Historical Society, this is Oklahoma Journeys. I’m Michael Dean.
For the southern plains tribes - the Arapaho, Cheyenne, Commanches, Kiowas, and Plains Apaches - the slow but consistent approach of white settlers into their territory brought a complete change in their lifestyles and culture. These southern plains tribes lived a nomadic lifestyle, one that required them to follow the buffalo and move freely over large areas. Each of these tribes claimed as their territory, lands that stretched from present day Texas to Montana, and all of that area was utilized by these tribes and necessary for their existence. However, this far ranging lifestyle didn’t fit well with the Euro-American concept of small private holdings all plowed, farmed and fenced in. The two groups or lifestyles just weren’t compatible and every attempt to make them such ultimately ended in failure.
It was in this week of 1867 that a monumental effort was put forth by all groups involved to end this repeated pattern of failed attempts. In October of 1867 over five thousand Native Americans, representing the southern plains tribes, met several hundred representatives of the US Government and military near the present day Medicine Lodge, KS. The result was the Medicine Lodge Peace Treaty, a document that altered forever the lives of everyone involved. Realizing the futility of their situation, these tribes agreed to give up their ancestral lands, stretching over at least five different states, for lands in western Oklahoma. The vast reduction of holdings from approximately 90 plus million acres to less than three meant great changes for the tribes. For hundreds of years they were self-sufficient; now, they were forced to rely on the government for food and aid. Once they had free reign over much of the western United States. Now that land was reduced to basically five or six counties of present-day western Oklahoma. The change was drastic and not favorable to the Native Americans; it also was not successful. Many members of the tribes, usually the younger males, resented the Medicine Lodge treaty and purposefully flaunted the rules, moving into and out of the Oklahoma reservations whenever they wanted, sometimes for peaceful reasons and sometimes not, with the result being a number of engagements with the US Army. Regardless of its intent or success, the subjugation of the plains tribes occurred via the Medicine Lodge Treaty and it was in this week of 1868, that the treaty passed through Congress and went into affect, inevitably meaning the end of the traditional culture of the southern plains tribes. The Oklahoma History Center features an entire gallery telling the story of American Indians in the territory and state and includes the story of the Medicine Lodge Treaty of 1867. In addition, the research library contains much information on other areas of Native American history, and it’s open for use by the public. The Oklahoma History Center is located on NE 23rd Street just east of Lincoln Blvd. in Oklahoma City. Oklahoma Journeys is a production of the Oklahoma Historical Society dedicated to the collection, preservation, and sharing of our state’s past. I’m Michael Dean.