December 26, 2001

DAKOTA INDIAN FOUNDATION ESTABLISHES JOHN F. LINDLEY ENDOWMENT FOR AMERICAN INDIAN ORAL HISTORY PROJECT

VERMILLION, S.D. – To honor its founder, John F. Lindley of Chamberlain, S.D., the Dakota Indian Foundation (DIF) has established the John F. Lindley Endowment through The University of South Dakota Foundation. The endowment will fund an oral history project with American Indians and will be administered by USD’s Institute of American Indian Studies.

The project’s purpose is to collect 50 one-hour interviews yearly with the Grey Eagle Generation, the elders of all the Sioux Tribes. The five-year project will help save some 250 voices of those elders, and their interviews will be sent to the Oral History Center at the Institute to be transcribed, archived, and assembled into multimedia presentations for use in schools. The Oral History Center at USD currently contains 1,948 taped interviews of American Indians collected since the mid-1960’s.

According to Institute of American Indian Studies Director Leonard Bruguier, many of the people interviewed 30 and 40 years ago are the Grey Eagle elders of today. “That’s why this project is so important. We have been concerned that the lack of sustained funding for the last 30 years would bring about a generational loss of information,” said Brugier. “We really appreciate the opportunity the DIF has given us to preserve and learn from the immense knowledge of these elders.”

DIF was founded as an independent, non-sectarian, non-profit corporation. DIF grants have funded groups and organizations throughout the Sioux Nation, supporting a wide variety of activities directly related to the social enhancement, economic development, and cultural preservation of the Dakota Sioux Indian People.  John Frank Lindley, attorney and longtime resident of Chamberlain, is a former state representative and lieutenant governor of the State of South Dakota. Lindley organized the Foundation due to concern for the plight of the Dakota Sioux Indians and a desire to help preserve their history and culture. His wife, Carina Lindley, has also been involved with the effort. Long-time Chamberlain resident Dr. Lambert Holland collaborated with Lindley and was involved as a DIF board member for thirty years. His son, Tom Holland, a dentist in Dakota Dunes, S.D., was instrumental in involving the USD Foundation with DIF.

For more information contact Leonard Bruguier, director of the Institute of American Indian Studies, at (605) 677-5209.