WSD Productions presents, “Remember the Children”, a short film (23min) addressing Indian Boarding Schools in America. There were over 400 government funded, often church run, Indian Boarding Schools in the US. Thousands of children died at these schools throughout the 19th and 20th centuries… This is the story of the Rapid City Indian Boarding School. These stories have been kept alive through the elders… the grandmothers that never forgot and continued to share the stories of the forgotten children. They are no longer forgotten through the advocacy of historians and community members sharing the stories of the children. As a result of the community advocacy and partners that want positive change, the Children’s Memorial is now a reality.
The federal government created a series of boarding schools throughout the nation in an attempt to assimilate Native American children from the 1800s-1960s. There were several in South Dakota, including the Rapid City Indian Boarding School (1898-1933). After serving as the Indian Boarding School, this facility became a segregated Indian tuberculosis clinic from the 1930s-1960s, the “Sioux Sanatorium.”
Children were brought to Rapid City Indian Boarding School predominantly from the tribes of the Great Sioux Nation (particularly Pine Ridge, Cheyenne River, Rosebud), but children came here from as far away as Gros Ventre, Northern Cheyenne, Flathead, and Chippewa. A significant percentage of the Rapid City Native American community are descendants of the children who survived after being brought to the Rapid City Indian Boarding School.
As with most Indian boarding schools, the mortality rate was very high, and the government did not keep records of the deaths of the children or where they were buried.
However, we know from oral histories and from years of independent research, including in the federal archived school records, that at least 50 children and infants passed away (the number is surely significantly higher).
This short film is intended to be the start of the story and create a full-length documentary that explores the whole story in more depth. This short emphasizes the history of the Rapid City Boarding School and the Remember he Children community’s efforts to find and protect the children’s graves. This film will lead to the full story and other aspects of memorial development, legal land issues and current issues associated with what was the Rapid City Boarding School.
https://www.rememberingthechildren.org
https://www.warrior-society.com