ABSTRACT
This chapter examines early reservation economic and political arrangements in order to assess conflicting claims about Oglala self-sufficiency, find historical antecedents to the pattern of inequity in land ownership and control. Cattle rising had become an important part of the reservation economy as early as 1893. Pine Ridge Reservation is situated on the short grass plains, and before it was overgrazed by outside interests encouraged by the Office of Indian Affairs, it was a stockman’s paradise. Office of Indian Affair’s policy was officially aimed at increasing the size of the cattle herds, and to that end they tried to regulate even the subsistence use of cattle. Oglala mixed bloods and white men married to Oglala women generally owned the largest herds, reflecting the fact that they had been in the cattle business along the North Platte River before they settled near the Pine Ridge Agency.
