What Were Native American Boarding Schools?

Liam Heffernan: 00:00:01

This week, we are discussing what President Joe Biden called, and I quote, one of the worst chapters in American history. Though this chapter lasted over a hundred years and resulted in the systematic abuse and murder of hundreds of Native Americans.

FYI, this won't be a cheery episode and it might contain some distressing content as I find out what were Native American boarding schools? Welcome to America, a history podcast.

I'm Niam Heffernan, and every week we answer a different question to understand the people, the places, and the events that make the USA what it is today. Returning to the podcast today is Jacqueline Fear Siegel, professor of American and Indigenous histories at the University of East Anglia.

Jackie, welcome back.

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:01:08

Hello. Good. Good to be back again. Thank you, Liam.

Liam Heffernan: 00:01:10

Yeah, it's. It's good to have you on the podcast. I.

I feel like, because I always get you on the show to talk about Native American history, you've become a bit of an angel of death on this podcast because we always have such a gloomy conversation.

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:01:23

Yes. You'll have to give me something upbeat next time.

Liam Heffernan: 00:01:26

Yeah, we'll have to make sure that. Okay. But on this episode, I'm afraid to say I don't think there's an awful lot of cheery stuff to be covering, but important nonetheless.

So for the sake of context here, I'm just hoping, firstly, you can give us a bit of background on what these Native American boarding schools were.

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:01:48

orward right through into the: 1960

But in fact, from the very beginning, from the first time that white settlers had to encounter native peoples, the idea of schooling them, to quote, civilized them, was always there.

But I think what we're going to be talking about today is the boarding school system, which was funded or supported by the federal government and which was directly aimed at bringing all native children into an educational environment where they could be, quote, re educated and taught the language and the religion and the habits and wear the clothing of the settler population. So this is like something which has been going on for 150 years, but which also had its roots way back in the early days of settlement.

Liam Heffernan: 00:02:46

So in terms of, you know, the numbers, what. What's the scale of this exactly?

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:02:51

Well, it's. It's very interesting. We don't really quite know how many boarding schools there were.

There are some sources that say, you know, that there were sort of 2 or 300.

But the latest count, and this has been done by The National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition, they have compiled a list which identifies all the schools that operated in the United States from the very start of the 19th century. And on their list they've got 523 schools. So that's going to be a fluid number.

But it's estimated that at the current research knowledge, there were over 500 schools functioning to educate Native American children.

Liam Heffernan: 00:03:33

And was there a sort of geographic trend in where these schools were?

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:03:39

Well, of course, most.

By the time that this school system was set up, almost most of the native population had been moved to west of the Mississippi or had moved voluntarily when the settler population was impinging on them. So most of the schools that were set up were in the West.

But this, the system or the blueprint for these schools was developed in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, which, as we know, is right on the east coast.

And this was the model school to show that if you took children away from their communities, from their parents, from their traditions, that the goal was you could give them the skills to become American citizens. So the first government model school was in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

But then there were 25 of these, what were known as off reservation boarding schools, where you could really take the children away from their homes. And then once these were operating, almost every single reservation had a boarding school run by the federal government as part of the agency system.

So there were schools that affected every single native nation across the United States. And by the mid-20s, when the system had reached its peak, it said that about 80% of native children were attending boarding schools.

So in about one year alone, there are about 60,000 native children in boarding schools.

So what we can see is it's a massive operation funded by the federal government with charity support and church backup that basically touched every single native community.

Liam Heffernan: 00:05:19

Okay, so just to make sure that I'm, I guess processing everything you've said correctly here. So. So the.

The government set up hundreds of boarding schools with, it seems, the express purpose of separating Native American children from their families and teaching them how to be proper Americans. Is that right?

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:05:44

Yes. Well, to begin with, I mean, the first schools were not financed by the government. The first schools were missionary schools.

Obviously the missionaries goal was to save their souls was to Christianize. And part of that was to basically, quote, civilize them. It was seen as being sort of parallel operations.

And the government did channel funds through the missionary schools at the beginning because they were already in operation. Right from the beginning they were in operation. Missionaries went out from all the different denominations in order to Christianize.

Then from the last quarter of the 19th century, when it became imperative for the settler population to be able to move on to lands that had been traditionally held and lived in by the Native nations. Then the government moves in with a program of government finance schools, and then it became a slightly different operation.

Obviously Christianity still was very important, but the main goal was to try and make the surviving Native population acceptable neighbors for the white settler population that was moving across the continent so quickly.

Liam Heffernan: 00:06:52

So this, this all sounds very consistent with a lot of the stuff that we've, we've chatted about before on the podcast in terms of the US Settlers really seeing Native communities as these kind of uncivilized almost barbarians that need to be sort of appropriated into proper society.

And so at the time that this was all done, this must have seemed like a very, almost quite a, quite a compassionate and sort of generous project on behalf of the government.

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:07:27

Right, you're absolutely right.

Because obviously there's one branch of people, particularly the military, that thought the most straightforward thing would be to wipe out these population. But that was a very difficult thing to achieve and quite expensive.

So that the people that basically drove this educational project at the beginning, they called themselves Friends of the Indian.

And they saw their friendship as being based in the readiness to include them in this wonderful American experiment and allow them to aspire to American citizenship if they would first make themselves, quote, civilized. And it wasn't a new idea.

Thomas Jefferson, from the very beginning thought the native populations could be absorbed, but they would have to give up their, quote, savage ways. So yes, you're quite right, there was a generosity on part of these Friends of the Indians because they thought that they were being less racist.

They were seeing these Native populations as possible American citizens if they would, as I say, give up all their traditional ways.

egislation that was passed in: 1887

And under that legislation, the Native population would be given pieces of land, small pieces, 160 acres, to make them into yeoman farmers like the Jeffersonian ideal. And in exchange, the white population would take the large amounts of their reservations that would be left.

So there was a sort of unholy alliance between the so called Friends of the Union and the settlers. And the United States government, of course, wanted that land to be settled, wanted to absorb this whole continent into the Union.

Liam Heffernan: 00:09:23

Yeah. And for anyone listening at this point, they might be thinking, oh, you know it doesn't sound so bad. It's just a boarding school.

You know, obviously, you know, it's. It's not a great idea in hindsight in what they were doing, but not too bad.

I mean, subsequently, I think it was just two, three years ago, there was an investigation by the Interior Department that did actually unveil the. The level of kind of a horror that existed within these boarding schools.

And from my own research, seems like there was at least 973people that died in these schools. So how did we get from.

We're going to set up some boarding schools to teach native people how to be, you know, proper Americans to nearly a thousand people dying.

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:10:16

Well, the numbers are still being documented and the real number isn't known. It's most likely far more than that.

And not only did many of the children die in the schools, but also a lot were sent home sick and they would die back in their homes.

And I think how we got there is, I suppose, if we can imagine, a set of institutions where there is absolutely no regard for the well being of the children and there are no safeguarding, as we would call them, no safeguarding provisions. So the parents had no power to intervene. And basically the children were dependent on the good behaviour of the teachers and the people running them.

And I think we know from other institutional stories that this cannot always lead to a good result for the children.

So that I think the first time it was realized or the first time it was acknowledged by the white communities that there had been something quite horrific happen in these schools was actually in Canada, which had a parallel system, which had a Truth and Reconciliation Commission. And over 7,000 survivors of what was called the residential school system gave testimony.

And that testimony told of some very horrific cruelties, abuses, neglect, sexual and other traumas, as well as deaths.

And so in: 2008

Now, Native peoples across the continent knew these schools had had terrible abuses committed there and also knew the legacies of taking people away from home for so long when they come back in.

So it's not been a secret amongst native communities, but I think it's only become openly discussed in Canada and the United States in the last couple of decades.

Liam Heffernan: 00:12:27

Let's talk a bit more about the conditions and within these schools. What were the living standards like for children in these schools?

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:12:39

I think it was very mixed. And one of the things we need to remember is these schools existed over a long period of time.

So at certain periods it was better than others, in certain periods it was worse. And different schools had different standards.

So if Carlisle, for example, right at the start, was run with military precision, and that school was probably better financed than others later on. But this was, if you like, a whole system run by a very bureaucratic operation from Washington.

And so there was lack of free, there was lack of clothing, there was physical, sexual, cultural abuses going on all the time. And basically the children had very few ways of complaining or making any kind of protest. There was a period of time.

of time, for example, in the: 1930

But we can never get away from the fact that these were institutions set up to radically eradicate the cultures of the children.

And therefore they weren't allowed to speak their languages, they weren't allowed to wear their own clothing, they weren't allowed to practice any of their traditions, they were forced to learn a basic rudimentary academic syllabus and also to work in the schools to make them function. So they were actually working as labour to keep these schools operating.

So it was a tough system and incredibly traumatic for a large number of people who attended. Some people went away with skills that they could use later on and could make their way in settler community.

But for the vast majority, it was an experience that was. Had elements of trauma to different degrees.

Liam Heffernan: 00:14:46

I understand, although don't agree with any way whatsoever.

I understand what they were doing in terms of the purpose of these boarding schools and therefore why they wouldn't allow them to speak their native languages or celebrate their native cultures. What I don't understand in all of this is, even if that's the goal, why make it so barbaric? Why the abuse? Why the horrible conditions?

It doesn't make sense to me.

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:15:20

Well, I suppose some of it's finance. You're financing a system from federal funds for a group of people that were seen as being inferior. So the funding was not good.

Some of it's the lack of surveillance of any kind of the people that are running these schools. And we've seen in our own society how that can lead to terrible abuses.

se in the United States, from: 1891

So there was, if they withheld their children, their food rations on which they were dependent, because they'd been sequestered on very small areas of land and their economic base had been destroyed, the children. The power of the parents to withhold their children to. Was removed.

So in a sense, you've got a completely open field for any kind of abuse that's possible. And I'm not saying it happened always or everywhere.

But there were no safeguards to protect these children or to fund the schools properly or to essentially allow the voice of the parents who might have wanted to adapt certain aspects of the curriculum or certain ways in which the children's lives were controlled, but had no power to do that. So in a sense, you've got a system that's running entirely unsupervised by anything except the consciences of those that were doing it.

Liam Heffernan: 00:17:00

And when we consider, though, that there was also an effort to ring fence land, albeit very small plots of land for Native American communities, I don't understand why assimilation was so important when, you know, they could have lived their lives. They could have still contributed. This just. This all feels so unnecessary. So why was this project just so important to the government?

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:17:28

For the Plains tribes? They couldn't actually have lived their lives as they had previously because that was dependent on the buffalo.

All of those Plains tribes were essentially using the buffalo as their economic base. And the buffalo moved over all these lands so that if they were going to remain dependent on the buffalo, they would have to keep their lands.

And the main goal of the government was essentially to transfer traditional ownership of the lands from Native nations to the American nation. And if that was going to happen, there had to be some kind of solution. What were you going to do with the remaining Native population?

And so there aren't huge numbers. By this time. They had diminished.

And it was therefore seen as a problem that you could solve by putting Native nations on small areas of lands called reservations and educating their children. And it was thought that if all the children went through the schooling system, that the problem could be solved in a generation.

Liam Heffernan: 00:18:33

Following on from that, you know, to your point there, I mean, we've discussed as well, you know, in some detail, and I'll link to these.

These episodes about, you know, the sort of brutality of the US in wiping out these Native communities and their apparent compulsion to need to sort of indoctrinate. But what I think really surprised me when I was reading into these boarding schools is just how recently they were still in operation.

And because we See, and we think about all of this as something that happened so long ago. But these boarding schools existed in living memory for many of us, didn't they?

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:19:17

They did. The boarding school era went on a long time, although there were adaptations.

And the remaining Bureau of Indian affairs boarding schools that are still running have very different curricula. They are much more open to recognizing and encouraging Native traditions. So there has been.

Of the ones that have survived in the United States, there have been adaptations thanks to the realization that Native children do a lot better if they can stay in contact with their communities and still remain learning their languages, etc.

But what happened in the period of time when they were operational is that a large amount of the language and the cultures were actually either destroyed or suppressed.

So what is going on now is a revival attempt to relearn the languages, to reteach the cultures, and to make contact with a lot of the traditions that had been literally wiped out by the boarding schools, not only because the boarding schools didn't allow the children to practice them, but also because when the children went home, there was a fear of speaking their language, of maintaining their cultures, and therefore, a lot of the residues of their cultures that they had held onto were lost, but not totally. And that's what we're seeing right now is a revival or a resurgence of the cultures that the boarding schools had suppressed.

And what I think it's useful to remember is it wasn't just Native American cultures that were being suppressed, and the invitation was to forget your past.

The immigrant population that was coming in from Europe, all those different immigrants, they too were being invited to assimilate and acculturate, learn the English language, become part of a settler community or a white settler society, not maintain their traditions. And so it was a general acceptance. The idea was that you became an American.

And obviously, immigrant communities did keep aspects of their culture going. And also, immigrant communities had a stake in the economy. They got jobs, they became. They gained an advantage by coming to America.

They had made a choice to join American society. And.

And of course, you could always go home if you were an immigrant, whereas Native people, of course, were at home and they were having to struggle to maintain their own cultures on their homelands, which were diminishing.

Liam Heffernan: 00:21:51

Yeah. I mean, how do you even begin to salvage all of that, that. That. That lost and suppressed culture?

Because, I mean, this is something that happened, you know, over. You know, you said 150 years. You can't just pick up where you left off, can you?

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:22:09

No, you're right. And I think the word loss is key. But there were always people that maintained their languages.

There are still people today who speak the languages, whose parents spoke the language, whose grandparents spoke the language, who have managed to maintain cultural connection. So despite what the boarding schools were doing, some groups, some Native nations and some individuals have maintained all the context.

But a lot haven't.

And as well as the loss of culture and welfare tradition, there's also, of course, all the trauma that was inflicted by, first of all, taking children away from their parental homes and their communities. And we see in the communities nowadays huge amounts of substance abuse, abuse, very, very high suicide rates amongst the Native population.

And very often what happens in the boarding schools, the loss of a parental and support and a community continuation is seen as being the cause of a lot of the problems that are endemic to Native societies.

Liam Heffernan: 00:23:18

Yeah, it's really sad to sort of just hear about the. The impacts that these kind of programs have had. And even sadder to just think how recently this was happening.

And it just, it makes me wonder, you know, what this says about sentiment towards Native Americans even today. Is there still a prejudice against Native communities?

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:23:44

I think in the United States there is a system of racism which obviously has its deepest roots in slavery and in the black population, but also has a huge impact on Native communities. In fact, the closer Native communities are to living alongside white people, the worse the racism is.

But the United States has a very peculiar relationship with its Native population.

It's a sort of love hate thing, to put it very crudely, because on the one hand, there is obviously racism and a belief that Native people are inferior.

On the other hand, there's this romanticization of, you know, the warrior and, you know, this wearing of the headdress which has had to be stopped in all sorts of areas. And the idea that Native culture is in some ways connected with an environmentalist movement by, you know, very complicated white ideas.

So I think, you know, the Pocahontas idea, if you were related to Pocahontas, you were seen as not as not being black or colored or in Virginia because you had a royal stamp on you. So I think it's not as straightforward as a love, as a hate relationship.

It's very much a romanticization of a Native community that doesn't exist and a refusal to accept the demands of the Native community that do exist, the demands of sovereignty, the demands for protection of water rights, of traditional rights, etc. So it is, if you like, a much more complicated relationship than the black white relationship. I think because of this love Hate aspect.

And obviously the hate aspect came forward in terms of what went on in the schools. The motto was, which is attributed to the man who set up the first government supported school, which was the Carlisle Indian School.

The motto was seen as Kill the Indian and save the man. I kill every aspect of Indianness, but save the living individual. Which of course is a rather horrific motto.

Liam Heffernan: 00:25:53

Yeah. And it got me thinking really, that this is this, this sort of love hate relationship that you describe.

It's almost like native cultures can exist as long as they exist through this kind of Caucasian American gaze. Right. And as long as it doesn't offend or threaten the. These sort of white sort of systems that are in place.

And it just epitomizes just the level of the appropriation and the suppression of native culture, doesn't it?

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:26:29

Yes. And it isn't Native cultures. It's not allowing native cultures to exist. It's basically a sort of new age version that white people can appropriate.

But I think it's important when thinking about these boarding schools to remember that in all settler colonial nations, not just Canada, but in New Zealand and Australia, they had similar programs, programs where they took children away and essentially tried to indoctrinate them, the settler culture. So it isn't just an American thing. It's basically when you get a system of settler colonialism.

And the question arises, what do you do with the indigenous population when you want bare land in order to move your nation forward? And one of the answers that obviously was developed was massacre was one answer. But then this notion of education or civilizing them.

So it's not just an American thing. But I think we are talking about the American boarding schools and obviously had a very special kind of status in the United States.

Liam Heffernan: 00:27:32

And we should probably acknowledge that. As I mentioned in the introduction to this episode, President Joe Biden did refer to this as one of the most horrific chapters in American history.

And he did that whilst issuing a formal apology for the boarding schools. But from what we've discussed so far, it just feels like an apology for this kind of thing is too little too late. Really.

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:28:00

Yes. I mean, the Biden apology came right in the 11th hour of his presidency.

And you're right, it was seen by native people as it was greeted as political good, a very good thing to have happened. But as you say, too little too late. It should have come earlier.

, the Canadians apologized in: 2008

There must be support for allowing the programs to restore the cultures which have been destroyed by these schools to be financed and to be encouraged and to be supported so that the languages and the cultures can be properly revived by the tribal communities, not by any kind of intervening white state activity. And that it can be recognized that this was, as President Biden called it, this was a blotch on the history of America.

And so whatever the so called advantages of getting a white education might have been, that overall this was a rather horrific period and a series of activities in which the government not only engaged, but financed all those years.

Liam Heffernan: 00:29:24

uched on this, was in October: 2024

At that point, he was essentially a lame duck president because he'd already cancelled his re election bid. It just, it feels like quite an easy thing to do when you don't actually have to deal with the consequences or take any action off the back of that.

Right. And it would have been more meaningful, surely, at the beginning of a presidential term.

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:29:57

Well, the apology came at the end, but President Biden was a supporter of indigenous rights.

And I think we can see that very well reflected because he appointed a Secretary of the Interior, that's the person who controls or has authority over all federal lands. He appointed Debs Harlan, who is a Laguna Pueblo from New Mexico. She's a member of the Laguna tribe.

So he appointed for the very first time a Native American to be in control of the Department of the Interior. And she pushed forward an investigation into these boarding schools.

So in some senses, you could say Biden initiated the opening up of a conversation through this appointment and the recognition that there were interests of Native people in, in federal lands.

Liam Heffernan: 00:30:51

And that's a fair point. It does make me wonder though, where does America go from here? Because sure, the boarding schools don't exist.

The brutality maybe doesn't exist in quite the same way that it did 100, 200 years ago, but what steps need to be taken to repair that relationship and ensure that Native Americans are treated fairly again?

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:31:17

Well, I mean, obviously the present presidency doesn't feel as though it's likely to go this route.

But I think what Native people ask for is unlike African Americans who wanted to join American society, Native people want to preserve and protect their own cultures, to be given as much sovereignty as is possible. Over their own lands, over their own activities.

And so and obviously given financial support for the programs that will allow the revival of these cultures which have been destroyed by the boarding schools.

e all American citizens since: 1924

I want to finish on a more upbeat word because I think one of the things that we need to remember when we're looking at this very black period is that the goal of that program was to obliterate all Native cultures. And that has not been achieved. One of the things that Native people say when they look at the boarding school experiment is we are still here.

We are still here. We still have our cultures. We are still following a lot of our traditions.

And there has been this huge amount of resilience, not only resistance, but resilience in all the different Native communities. And they continue to show resilience and they continue to show the spirit that they are going to fight.

een known at standing rock in: 2016

Liam Heffernan: 00:33:22

Yeah, it's a lovely note to end on and it does suggest that resilience among Native communities is something that should certainly be celebrated.

And of course, there's a lot more that we can talk about here and we will continue to do so on the podcast, but we're going to wrap up this particular conversation here.

Jackie, as always, thank you for joining me to talk about this and for anyone listening, if you are really interested in what we've discussed, leave some links in the show notes so that you can explore further. Jackie, if anyone wants to connect with you directly, where can they do that?

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:34:03

Well, my email, you can find me on my UEA site, but my email is J. Fear Siegel.ac.uk and can I just.

I just want to end with a quotation from Debbie, past secretary of the Ontario under Biden, when she wrote, when she says, in relation to the boarding schools, our past can never be rewritten, but together we can heal.

Liam Heffernan: 00:34:33

Yeah, that's a great note to end on. Thank you, Jackie.

And anyone listening to this, take heed and also do leave us a rating and a review if you have found this conversation interesting and insightful. And if you follow the podcast, all future episodes will appear in your feed as well.

We're going to record a little bonus episode that will be available a few days after this. However, if you support the show, then you will get access to that at the same time that the main episode drops.

So thank you very much for listening and goodbye.

Jacqueline Fear-Segal: 00:35:14

Sa.