Irrigation, timber, and hydropower : negotiating natural resource development on the Flathead Indian Reservation, Montana, 1904-1945 / by Garrit Voggesser
Flathead Indian Reservation Irrigation and Power Project (U.S.) History Search this
Physical description:
141 pages : illustrations, map ; 26 cm
Type:
Books
Place:
Montana
Flathead Indian Reservation
Confederated Salish & Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Reservation, Montana
Flathead Indian Reservation (Mont.)
Kerr Dam (Mont.)
Date:
2017
20th century
Notes:
NMAI copy purchased with funds from the Lloyd and Charlotte Wineland Library Endowment for Native American and Western Exploration Literature.
Contents:
Making the Flathead Reservation "blossom as the rose" : the Flathead Irrigation Project -- "A lot of trouble about wood" : timber and forestry on the Flathead Reservation -- The "Indian Muscle Shoals" : power development on the Flathead Reservation -- Afterword
Summary:
"The Flathead Irrigation Project and the Flathead Lake dam were two early twentieth century enterprises that still reverberate through the twenty-first century Flathead Reservation in western Montana. Voggesser's research in this book has begun to unpeel the origins and history of natural resource conflicts on the reservation. The Flathead Irrigation Project was originally promoted by Senator Joseph M. Dixon as benefiting the Flathead Reservation tribes. It soon morphed into a medium for using tribal funds and assets to benefit white homesteaders. Voggesser tells the story of how competing interests fought to benefit at the expense of the tribes. In the 1920s and early 1930s, a national controversy swirled around the dam site at the foot of Flathead Lake. The lease for the dam site was granted to the Montana Power Company over the objections of the tribes, but the tribes retained ownership and was able to negotiate from a position of strength fifty years later when the lease came up for renewal. Voggesser lays out the struggles by which the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes were able to secure control of reservation resources and build a better future for tribal members."--Provided by publisher.
