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Menominee

The Menominee (/məˈnɑːməˌni/; Menominee: omǣqnomenēwak meaning "Menominee People",[2] also spelled Menomini, derived from the Ojibwe language word for "Wild Rice People"; known as Mamaceqtaw, "the people", in the Menominee language) are a federally recognized tribe of Native Americans officially known as the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin. Their land base is the Menominee Indian Reservation in Wisconsin. Their historic territory originally included an estimated 10 million acres (40,000 km2) in present-day Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. The tribe currently has about 8,700 members.

For other uses, see Menominee (disambiguation).

Federal recognition of the tribe was terminated in the 1960s under policy of the time which stressed assimilation. During that period, they brought what has become a landmark case in Indian law to the United States Supreme Court, in Menominee Tribe v. United States (1968), to protect their treaty hunting and fishing rights. The Wisconsin Supreme Court and the United States Court of Claims had drawn opposing conclusions about the effect of the termination on Menominee hunting and fishing rights on their former reservation land. The U.S. Supreme Court determined that the tribe had not lost traditional hunting and fishing rights as a result of termination, as Congress had not clearly ended these in its legislation.


The tribe regained federal recognition in 1973 by an act of Congress, re-establishing its reservation in 1975. It operates under a written constitution establishing an elected government. The tribe took over tribal government and administration from the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) in 1979.

Keshena (most, population 1,268)

Legend Lake (most, population 1,525)

(part, population 281)

Middle Village

(most, population 690)

Neopit

(most, population 98)

Zoar

Government[edit]

The tribe operates according to a written constitution. It elects a tribal council and chairman.


The Menominee developed the College of Menominee Nation in 1993 and it was accredited in 1998. It includes a Sustainable Development Institute. Its goal is education to promote their ethic for living in balance on the land.[32] It is one of a number of tribal colleges and universities that have been developed since the early 1970s, and one of two in Wisconsin.

Current tribal activities[edit]

The nation has a notable forestry resource and ably manages a timber program.[33] In an 1870 assessment of their lands, which totaled roughly 235,000 acres (950 km2), they counted 1.3 billion standing board feet (3.1 million cubic metres) of timber. As of 2002 that has increased to 1.7 billion board feet (4.0 million m3). In the intervening years, they have harvested more than 2.25 billion board feet (5.3 million m3).[34] In 1994, the Menominee became the first forest management enterprise in the United States certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC.org).[35][36]


Since June 5, 1987, the tribe has owned and operated a Las Vegas-style gaming casino, associated with bingo games and a hotel. The complex provides employment to numerous Menominee; approximately 79 percent of the Menominee Casino-Bingo-Hotel's 500 employees are ethnic Menominee or are spouses of Menominee.[37]

– actor who starred in Babylon 5 and films

Apesanahkwat

- actress, Hawkeye & Echo

Alaqua Cox

– activist and Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, 1993–1997

Ada Deer

– lover of 1930s serial bank robber John Dillinger

Billie Frechette

Mitchell Oshkenaniew – advocate for sovereignty and recognition by federal government

[38]

(1795–1858) – chief of Menominee during period of land cessions and restriction to reservation within Wisconsin

Chief Oshkosh

– actress, Thunderheart (1995)

Sheila Tousey

– Co-founder, Fund for the Four Directions, indigenous activist; killed in 1999 in Colombia by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia

Ingrid Washinawatok

Beck, David R. M. (2005). The Struggle for Self-Determination: History of the Menominee Indians Since 1854. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press.

Boatman, John (1998). Wisconsin American Indian History and Culture. Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt Publishing.

Davis, Thomas (2000). Sustaining the Forest, the People, and the Spirit. Albany, N.Y.: State University of New York.

(2001). Indian Nations of Wisconsin: Histories of Endurance and Renewal. Madison: Wisconsin Historical Society Press.

Loew, Patty

Nichols, Phebe Jewell (Mrs. Angus F. Lookaround). Oshkosh The Brave: Chief of the Menominees, and His Family. Menominee Indian Reservation, 1954.

(1921). Material culture of the Menomini. Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation. Retrieved 25 August 2012.

Skinner, Alanson

Nancy Lurie (1972), "Menominee Termination: From Reservation to Colony," Human Organization, 31: 257–269

Nancy Lurie (1987), "Menominee Termination and Restoration," in Donald L. Fixico, ed., An Anthology of Western Great Lakes Indians History (Milwaukee: American Indian Studies Program): 439–478

Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin

Menominee Language Lessons

at University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point

The Menominee Clans Story

Anthropology.net

Perey, "The Menominee Myth of the Flood – in Relation to Life Today"

Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). . Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.

"Menominee Indians" 

Menominee website

"Treaties between the United States and the Menominee"

Indian Country, Milwaukee Public Museum

"Menominee"

in the L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University

Mitchell A. Dodge papers on the Menominee Indian Tribe, MSS 1538