I live in a unique city called Eden Prairie in Minnesota. Minnesota is rich with resources of all kinds. Water, forest, agricultural land, and minerals that have been mined for decades. Eden Prairie is unique in that it contains both prairie lands with natural wildflowers and other greenery that is chock full of medicinal plants and edibles that are easily foraged save the pesticides and fertilizers if you can find an area that hasn’t been tainted from development, not to mention it sits perfectly on the north side of the Minnesota River not too far from the convergence of the Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers.
My previous post, Water Watchers, is about the Frederick-Miller Spring and the property up the hill that is hoping to be sold by its owners. This article is a follow up to that because it about so much more than the spring, or the prairie. This is about history. History repeats itself over and over again. This special little piece of pristine heritage habitat is in jeopardy by the very people who claim to be leaders in historical preservation and environmental conservationists.
The ability for the space now called Eden Prairie was able to be settled because “in 1851, a treaty opened land west of the Mississippi River to settlement allowing pioneers to settle in what is now Eden Prairie. The town board of Eden Prairie held its first meeting in a log school house on May 11, 1858, the same day Minnesota became a state.”* Please take note of this date. Also take note that this historical event of a town on a significant bluff previously occupied by the Dakota was settled. “In 1858, a month after Minnesota became the 32nd state in the union, a group of Dakota leaders were summoned to Washington, DC, where they were detained until they signed another treaty relinquishing all land north and east of the Minnesota River to the United States.”** Let’s re-read that - THEY WERE DETAINED UNTIL THEY SIGNED ANOTHER TREATY. Basically these Dakota leaders were held captive until they did what the US Government wanted them to do. I’m guessing this ‘treaty’ was signed under duress. Why else would they continue to hand over land? The Dakota were not and are not weak people. But they did suffer from many disagreements between themselves and other tribes and settlers. The many tribes continued to suffer losses due to these conflicts and the settlers kept settling. The settlers continued to take over the land while the Dakota became weak and mal-nourished due to the fact that the game and provisions were not as bountiful on the south side of the river (what we know as Shakopee today). No one ‘founded’ Eden Prairie. It was taken. There was already a nation here before the settlers arrived and it was filled with many tribes of the Dakota indigenous people.
On May 27th, just over two weeks after this poignant date, the Dakota and the Ojibwe had a battle to end all battles in the valley by the river where a burger joint sits called Lion’s Tap. Not many from either side walked away from the battle. The tribes buried their people they lost in that battle on the hills by the river in what we now know as Eden Prairie. And more importantly, there have been archaeological findings in these hills from past developments that prove their existence there.
Let’s take another interesting piece of history and tie this all together. As the town of Eden Prairie was created and the State of Minnesota Constitution was ratified on the same day, it is very curious to me that the Dakota and Ojibwe battle happened two weeks later. I don’t believe in coincidences especially when it comes to control over the land. Through my research on the Treaty of 1858, I found that there was also Railroad legislation that coincided with all of the treaties in Minnesota with the Dakota. In a book titled Railroad legislation in Minnesota, 1849 to 1875, there is evidence that several bills were introduced into legislation (and several shot down) to incorporate railroad companies to improve the transportation system in the territory. By 1857, according to this reference, Minnesota had over 150,000 inhabitants which resulted in $50,000,000 in taxable property. This was finally a substantial enough amount of people to justify a railroad. This resource also noted that this development would push Minnesota to be one of the wealthiest of states. On February 26, 1857 the 24th Congress enabled an act for land grants that would aid in the construction of railroads in Minnesota. This is a little over a year before the Treaty of 1858 - The treaty that the Dakota were forced to sign. Do you see a common theme yet? Development, development, development.
I am not one to squash development, but when it’s done under nefarious pretenses and lies and deceit, that is definately a problem. What this tells me is that the Minnesota government had a plan for the land that wasn’t yet theirs. But they knew it would be because the minute the land was handed over everyone was ready to incorporate their towns along with the State when it was constituted in 1858. This leads me to think that maybe the Dakota-Ojibwe war was somehow instigated to create a reason for the US Government to continue to oppress and denigrate the Indigenous people for the land. The Dakota were psyoped, I believe, by the US Government for many, many years and the European pioneers were eagerly chomping at the bit to allow the railroad to go through so that future development would grow their wealth. Sound familiar?
***Please go to https://shakopeedakota.org/culture/hocokatati/ for more information on the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux and the history THEY experienced.
Resources:
*https://www.edenprairie.org/community/about-eden-prairie/eden-prairie-history#:~:text=In%201851%2C%20a%20treaty%20opened,day%20Minnesota%20became%20a%20state.
**https://www.usdakotawar.org/history/multimedia/1858-dakota-treaty-delegation