cranberry swamps they eke out an existence. The contrast between this class of Indians and the Winnebagos, whose incomes are entirely dependent upon their own work, is greatly in favor of the latter, who must work for a living or starve. At the time I was in Wisconsin any able-bodied human being who could work at all could find a paying job within reasonable distance of his home, and yet some of the Nebraska Winnebagos, who have moved to Wisconsin, who own no land in Wisconsin, and who have come to depend more upon their Nebraska rentals for ready cash than upon their own labor, complained to me that they had not received their checks from Nebraska this spring, and, therefore, could not go to the grocery to buy food because they had no money. Their neighbors, the Wisconsin Winnebagos, who have no lease money coming to them from Nebraska, were at work blasting stumps, clearing their lands, getting ready for spring farm operations, doing odd jobs for white men, etc. It seems to me that the Nebraska allotments of the Indians who have chosen to live in Wisconsin and who say they never will return to Nebraska should be sold and Wisconsin farm land bought with part of the proceeds, the balance going into improvements and farm equipment. I do not know if this could be done without the consent of the allottees, but it does seem a pity that a considerable number of able-bodied men and women should be encouraged to live idle, worthless lives because they happen to have small incomes from land which some of them never saw.

I am sorry to report that the Wisconsin Winnebago Indians, as a rule, are not complying with the State laws in regard to legal marriages. Their matrimonial habits are loose. The State laws are adequate to meet the situation; but with 1,200 Indians, scattered over so many counties, it is practically a physical impossibility for the agent, with his headquarters at Grand Rapids, to do anything in a legal way toward compelling these Indians to obey the laws touching marriage and divorce.

It must be remembered that only a few years ago the lumberjacks, saloons, roadhouses, and other agencies for evil, which went along with timber cutting, made up the environment of these Wisconsin Winnebagos and that during this period these Indians were homeless, living as best they could, from hand to mouth, and without helpful or protecting supervision. Had it not been for the Baptist missionaries in Mauston, the Lutheran missionaries and teachers at Wittenberg, and the Reformed Church missionaries at Black River Falls, it is quite probable the Wisconsin Winnebagos would to-day be almost entirely beyond help. Although the Indians continue to buy extracts from grocers, there has been a marked decrease in drunkenness in the last few years. In this matter the State and county authorities have cooperated most heartily with the Indian Service.

Peyote, or "medicine," as the Indians call it, is used by a large proportion of these Indians. The peyote buttons come by mail from Oklahoma, Texas, and Mexico. There are no peyote church buildings such as the Osages have, but the followers of this cult meet around in the homes of the more prosperous Indians. I talked with a number of the leaders of the peyote society, and they emphatically denied that the drug has any bad effect, morally or

physically, and that it is only used in connection with their religious meetings. Superintendent Dunn told me, however, that he feels quite certain that peyote "dopes" the Indians to a degree which prevents them from doing any work for several days. He added that one of the harmful tendencies of the peyote habit was due to the peyote church meetings, which took the Indians from necessary work for days at a time. When I asked him what could be done to put a stop to peyote using among his Indians, he said it would be impossible to stop it so long as the law did not prohibit the importation or the sale of peyote buttons.

About 94 of the children attend the public schools. The number of children of school age and eligible for school attendance is 366, and the total average of attendance at schools of all sorts is 182, which is one-half the number of the children. On its face this does not look promising, but many of the Indians live so far away from any public school that it is almost impossible for their children to attend one.

The Norwegian Lutheran Church bought the old Wittenberg school after it had been discontinued by the Indian Service, and is to-day taking care of over 100 children and doing exceptionally good work. Superintendent Dunn is continually urging the Indians to send their children to school, but the Indians are so fond of visiting each other and so many of them are continually on the move attending peyote church, feasts, or family affairs that their children are but intermittent attendants. Nevertheless, Mr. Dunn is encouraged, because each year a greater number of parents appear to realize the necessity of sending their children regularly to school.

There does not seem to be any real prejudice against Indians in Wisconsin. If there had been, it was wiped out by the record of the 51 young men who fought across the seas in the Great War. Of the 51 Winnebago Indian boys who went in the Army, 5 were killed, 18 were severely wounded and gassed; some of them were both wounded and gassed. This is a remarkably high percentage of fatalities and casualties. The local chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution presented the agency with a beautiful service flag and is to erect a marble shaft in Grand Rapids, on which will be a bronze tablet bearing a record of the Indian soldiers. The people of Portage, Wis., have raised funds to erect a monument to the memory of Corpl. Foster Decorah, a Winnebago, who was 46 years old at the time of the draft, and need not have gone, but who enlisted and was killed in the Argonne August 2, 1919. The war record of these Winnebago Indians is a matter of pride with the white people of that section, and the efforts of the Government to hasten the progress of these Indians should bring quick results because of the more friendly attitude of the Indians' white neighbors.

This jurisdiction has no physician, nurse, or field matron. During the influenza epidemic a contract physician was engaged. A great proportion of the Indians are full bloods, and most of them speak English; all are regarded as citizens of the United States and nearly 150 do vote.

The total area of Indian lands is nearly 15,000 acres, of which 12,774 are classed as agricultural and 2,000 as timber lands. The agri

cultural land is valued at $40 an acre. Most of this land is grazed by Indian stock, for only 1,836 acres were cultivated by the Indians last year. On this was raised 6,000 bushels of corn, 180,000 pounds of cucumbers, which were sold for $4,000, and 18,000 bushels of potatoes. As the land is cleared more of it will be put to agricultural uses and less to grazing. These Indians are employed in the cranberry marshes and a large part of their income is derived from picking cranberries and from other work in connection with that industry. That section. of the State is famous for its wild blueberries, and several thousand dollars are made each year by the Indians picking this small fruit. The paper mills at Grand Rapids and other industrial centers employ Indians, and some of them have become so expert that they enjoy permanent employment at good wages.

Compared with many other tribes, the problems presented by the Wisconsin Winnebagos are rather simple. One of the chief factors of the problem, as a whole, is the personality of the agent, for above all other things, these Indians need guidance, helpful advice from a disinterested friend, encouragement, and tactful insistence that they develop their lands so that the major part of their livelihood will come from their own soil. The average size of their farms is so small and the soil character so unattractive that these Indians, for a long time, will not be imperiled by the land lust of white men. This is a decided advantage to the Indians. Few of them have any money. There is no tribal fund nor tribal lands to excite the cupidity of land grafters.

If the agent in charge of these Indians is the kind of a man to hold their confidence and esteem; if he has a fair amount of common sense mixed with some tact; and if he has the real interest of his charges at heart, they will come along. Just now too many of them are inclined to be shiftless-they have not learned how to profit by continuous labor, but Supt. Dunn assured me they are learning. He said their general improvement during the last few years has been decidedly noticeable, and he is quite optimistic as to their future. He is constantly urging the Indians, and encouraging them, to clear more and more land, to build better homes, and to keep their children regularly in school. He took me to a number of farms which showed evidences of the progress the Indians are making. The white men of that section with whom I talked told me Mr. Dunn is doing good work, and that in the 22 months of his superintendency he had produced what to them seemed to be remarkable results.

Although the problem of these Indians is rather simple, the work of the agent is anything but easy, because the Indians are scattered over such a large area. Grand Rapids, on the Wisconsin River, is the agency headquarters. The extreme northeastern limit of the agency is Birnamwood, which is about 80 miles from Grand Rapids; Portage, the southeastern limit, is 80 miles; south and west across the State into Iowa the agency extends 145 miles, and northwest 150 miles. Most of the Indians live off the railroads, so it is necessary to travel by country roads. In winter, when calls to relieve distress and to attend the sick come to Grand Rapids, the roads often are almost impassable..

Supt. Dunn has put his working policy into five words, "Make the Indian self-reliant." Although he is of the opinion that he could use about $2,000 in reimbursable funds to good advantage

for the purchase of seed and necessary farm implements, he hesitates about making such a recommendation, for he is decidedly opposed to giving money to men who have at hand the opportunity to earn it. But I have no hesitancy in recommending that the Indian Office allot the Grand Rapids Agency what reimbursable funds the superintendent can advantageously use, for I feel confident Mr. Dunn will be exceedingly careful in the disposition of the money. From what I saw I feel he is on the right track and that he will carry out his plans to a successful end.

The Nebraska Winnebagos who have returned to Wisconsin either should be made to go back to Nebraska and work their farms or their Nebraska holdings should be transformed into Wisconsin farms. They are carried on the rolls at the Nebraska Agency; the Nebraska agent leases their lands for them, collects the rents, and sends the checks to Grand Rapids. Although there are only about 40 families in this class, there is a constant exchange of letters between the two agencies. The Nebraska Indians spend too much money and time traveling back and forth on the slightest pretext. They live waiting for their lease money and, waiting, refuse to work. When they are hard pressed for ready cash they may put in a few days at some kind of easy labor, but as a rule they are indolent and this indolence is bred and fostered by this lease money which, without effort or responsibility on their part, comes to them. They present a perplexing situation. It is one which should receive the best attention of the Indian Office, for the longer this situation continues the worse it will be for these Indians.

Respectfully submitted.

MALCOLM MCDOWELL, Member, Board of Indian Commissioners.

Hon. GEORGE VAUX, Jr.,

Chairman, Board of Indian Commissioners.

APPENDIX K.

REPORT ON THE LAONA INDIAN AGENCY, WIS., BY MALCOLM

MCDOWELL.

MAY 13, 1920.

SIR: One of the most encouraging signs of the progress the Indians of the country are making toward self-reliance and independence is furnished by the Wisconsin band of Potawatomi which I visited early this month. There I found a number of Indians living in Forest and Oconto Counties, northeastern Wisconsin, and in Menominee County, upper Michigan, who, in a comparatively few years, will be a self-supporting people, drawing the major part of their livelihood from their improved farms, if their present rate of progress continues, and there seems to be sound reasons for believing that they will advance even faster in the next few years.

About 15 years ago, according to the information given me by the white people of that section, these Indians, without homes of their own, were living in miserable shacks on cut-over land, doing little gainful work, deriving some money from trapping and from picking blueberries, and drinking up about all the money they got as quickly

as possible. In those days they were looked upon as a degraded lot, doomed to extinction, for whisky was easily obtainable from the many saloons in the country. Apparently only one man, outside of the Indian Service, in the community even attempted to do anything for them. This was the Rev. E. O. Morstad, of Carter, Wis., a missionary, who never ceased his efforts to secure from Congress for the Indians a recognition of their frequently denied claims for lands which the tribe had ceded to the United States under several treaties. Without going into the history of these treaties and the refusal, for many years, of the Indian Office to have anything to do with the Wisconsin Potawatomi, it is sufficient to state that the Indian act for 1913 carried an appropriation for $150,000 to purchase land for the Wisconsin and Michigan Potawatomi. Appropriations for improvements, such as houses, barns, fences, cattle, etc., followed; a second appropriation made in 1917 was for $100,000, of which $25,000 was paid per capita; another in 1918 was for $100,000, of which $25,000 was paid per capita; but the next appropriations, 1919 for $75,000 and 1920 for $15,500, were all for improvements only.

The results of these appropriations are that 350 Indians have farms, ranging from 40 to 50 acres, each bought for an average of $9.50 per acre (and which are now valued at over $30 an acre); 83 well-built, two-story farmhouses, 16 by 22 feet, many with cement basements and porches; 60 barns, 18 by 24, each soundly constructed; over 100 work horses; more than 100 wagons and 100 bobsleds; nearly 100 milk cows; hundreds of hogs and chickens; all kinds of necessary household furniture; 4 carloads of barb-wire fencing, most all of which has been put into fences; and a large quantity of agricultural implements.

Many of these houses were built entirely by Potawatomi Indian carpenters, and the lumber for the newest houses and barns, which was contracted for last year at $26 per thousand feet, is selling at the mills in that section of the country for $55 per thousand feet. The lands bought for the Indians are cut-over lands, the forest growth was hardwood, not pine, so that the soil is a good quality of sandy loam; and the Indian farms are identical as to soil, lay of the land, subsoil, drainage, access to market, and proximity to the State and county highways, with the farms of the neighboring white people.

A few years ago some stir was made in Washington by charges that the land bought for the Wisconsin Potawatomi was worthless and was covered with bowlders and rocks and that it could not be used agriculturally. Supt. W. W. Bennett took me over as much of the country as we could reach in the limited time at my disposal, and walked over many of the tracts bought for the Indians. It is true that glacial bowlders are a characteristic feature of that country. Every man who buys land in that part of Wisconsin must take his share of the bowlders, but I took particular pains to compare the Indian's land with the white man's land and could see no difference.

When the Indian tracts were selected it really was easy to pick the good land, and as the owners of the cut-over land, the lumber companies, were indifferent as to what kind of land was taken, for at that time all cut-over land looked alike to them, there was no reason why good instead of poor land should not have been selected.