At the center of all those identities remained the boy who had listened to older men talk in Montana.

The chain of memory was the constant.

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Source: https://www.nlm.nih.gov/nativevoices/timeline/598.html
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A Century Of Federal Indian Policy Seen Through One Life

Medicine Crow’s 102 years also provide a remarkable lens through which to view changing federal policy toward Native nations.

He was born during an era shaped by allotment and assimilation.

The federal government had spent decades breaking up tribally held lands, assigning parcels to individuals, opening “surplus” territory to non-Native settlement, and encouraging the destruction of collective political and economic systems.

Native children were sent to schools designed to replace Indigenous languages and customs with English-speaking American norms.

Religious practices faced restrictions.

Tribal governments operated under intense federal oversight.