The headquarters of the MHA Nation is west of New Town, about 75 miles southwest of Minot, and Belcourt, headquarters of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa is about 109 miles northeast of Minot.

The other tribes in North Dakota are the Spirit Lake Nation on the Spirit Lake Reservation, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe on the Standing Rock Reservation, a reservation straddling the North Dakota and South Dakota border, and the Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate Nation on the Sisseton-Wahpeton Reservation. The Trenton Indian Service Area, west of Williston, was established in the 1970s for tribal members to maintain their identity with the Turtle Mountain Chippewa Tribe.

“In total, there are 31,329 American Indians living in North Dakota, making up 4.9% of the total population. Almost sixty percent live on reservations and over forty percent of these American Indians are under the age of 20,” according to the North Dakota Indian Affairs Commission. Nationwide, there are over 500 federally recognized tribes – each with its own history, culture and language.

A 1931 published history of North Dakota states which tribe of Indians first occupied North Dakota is not known definitely, but it seems probable that the first occupants within historical times were Mandans and Hidatsas. The Arikara and Chippewa/Ojibway arrived later.

MDN File Photo Discussing solutions to road conditions and other problems within the Fort Berthold area are, from the left, Rolland McMaster, New Town mayor; August Little Soldier, tribal business council chairman; Fred Massey, Washington, D.C., assistant to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs; Adrian Foote, council vice chairman; Gary Gorder, president of the New Town Development Corp.; and Sanford Sand, president of the New Town Chamber of Commerce, shown in this August 1967 photo.

Fort Berthold Reservation and Turtle Mountain Reservation are the two reservations closest to Minot. The histories of the tribes on these two reservation date back many years.

Fort Berthold Reservation

Today’s Fort Berthold Reservation is in Dunn, McLean, McKenzie, Mountrail, Ward and Mercer counties.

The Mandans made their way to the upper Missouri River from the Ohio Valley earlier than other tribes, according to “North Dakota History” published in 1931. It is believed they first touched the Missouri River at the mouth of the White River and then moved upstream. By 1750 and probably years before, they reached the Heart River. They had nine villages at the time – several on the west side of the Missouri and two on the east side. Lewis and Clark in 1804-1805, found the nine villages of the Mandans reduced to two villages – one on each side of the river.

Conflicts with the Sioux and Assiniboin and smallpox pandemics in 1782 and 1837 reduced the number of the Mandans so the tribe moved to the vicinity of Stanton on the mouth of the Knife River where they occupied a village near the Hidatsa, according to “History of North Dakota.” When the Hidatsa moved from the mouth of the Knife River to Fort Berthold in 1845 the Mandans also moved in several migrations. Only an estimated 125 Mandans of a total population of about 1,600 were left after the smallpox pandemic of 1837.

MDN File Photo Francis Cree, center, of the Turtle Mountain Reservation, administers the sun dance to pass the tradition on to young Indians, shown in this June 1985 photo.

Originally part of the Crow people, the Hidatsa lived when first known to the whites at the mouth of the Knife River in close association with the Mandans and Arikara, according to “History of North Dakota.” About 1750 the Hidatsa lived near the mouth of the Heart River in close proximity to the Mandans, who also had villages at that point. Before 1796 the Hidatsa and Mandans moved to the vicinity of the Knife River, where Lewis and Clark found them in 1804. At that time the Hidatsa occupied three villages immediately bordering the Knife River on the west side of the Missouri and the Mandans lived in two villages a few miles down on opposite sides of the river.

The three Hidatsa villages had a population of 2,100 at the time of the Lewis and Clark expedition but the smallpox epidemic of 1837 reduced their numbers so those in the three villages united to form one. In 1845 they moved up river and settled at Fort Berthold.

The Arikara, an agricultural tribe, were found by French traders as early as 1770 living below the Cheyenne River in South Dakota, according to “History of North Dakota.” They were pushed northward along the Missouri River from South Dakota by the Sioux.

In 1804 Lewis and Clark found them, reduced in numbers, living in three villages between the Grand and the Cannon Ball. By 1851 they had moved up to the vicinity of the Knife River. Wars with the Sioux and smallpox pandemics almost wiped out some of their villages so those left consolidated and united.

The smallpox epidemic of 1837-38 devastated the three tribes. The three tribes came together in Like-a-Fishhook Village, but maintained tribal identity.

In 1851, the Fort Laramie Treaty established the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation. The reservation’s 12 million acres stretched from the Missouri to beyond the Yellowstone River in Montana but by the 1880s, the allotment system of private land ownership reduced the size of the reservation to about 1 million acres. In 1910, the U.S. government confiscated a large section of land from the reservation. Another reduction in the size of the reservation occurred in the 1950s when the United States built the Garrison Dam, creating the 152,300-acre Lake Sakakawea, dividing the reservation. The lake inundated much of the land, farms and homes and forced many families to uproot and move to drier land.

As a result of the most recent oil boom, the tribe and a number of its enrolled members are recipients of royalties. The reservation produces about 20 percent of the Bakken oil in North Dakota.

Mark Fox is the current chairman of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation.

Turtle Mountain Reservation

The Turtle Mountain Reservation is located in Rolette County and has a land base of about 12 miles by six miles.

The Chippewa or Ojibway moved from the eastern Great Lakes region to the northern Great Plains in the 1600s, about the same time as the first French traders and missionaries, according to historical accounts. They became heavily involved in the fur trade late in the 17th century and started moving west to Wisconsin, Minnesota, the Red River and beyond.

Failing in 1868 an attempt to establish a native state in Manitoba, Canada, in 1882, the Turtle Mountain Band requested official recognition from the U.S. government. The band received the 10 million-acre Turtle Mountain Reservation in 1882.

Two years later, the federal government decided most of the population was from Canada and reduced the size of the reservation. The federal government finally agreed in 1904 to compensate the tribe for the confiscated land. The Turtle Mountain Chippewa received $1 million, or 10 cents per acre, for their land.

The Burke Act of 1906 allotted land back to the tribe, according to historical accounts. Because there was not enough land inside the reservation, the allotments came from the public domain in South Dakota and Montana, far away from the Turtle Mountain Reservation. Many of the Chippewas who moved to the allotments never returned to the Turtle Mountain Reservation.

Belcourt, tribal headquarters, is on the reservation. Many tribal members also live in communities off the reservation.

The Trenton Indian Service Area, an agency of the Turtle Mountain Reservation, was established in the 1970s to manage the Chippewa land allotments in northeastern Montana and northwestern North Dakota.

Jamie Azure is the current chairman of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa.

Today, the Three Affiliated Tribes and Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa and other tribes in North Dakota are active in economic development and other ways to benefit tribal members. Strong efforts are also made to carry on traditions including culture and history for future generations.