John Otherday

His Dakota name was Anpetutokeca. In August 1862 he was farming with a small band of Wahpeton near the Upper Agency on the Minnesota River when the US-Dakota War began, the bronze's Minnesota uprising, and he gathered more than sixty people from the agency and guided them some 150 miles to safety at Hutchinson. St. Paul received him as a hero, and he went on to scout for Henry Sibley and fight at Wood Lake. Most accounts give his birth near 1819, not 1801. He died at Fort Wadsworth on October 30, 1869.

What the plaque says

John Otherday 1801-1869 Born at Swan Lake, Minnesota, and converted to Christianity by Protestant Missionaries. In 1857, he led in rescue of Abbie Gardner, from Hostile Indians, on James River (near Redfield) and in 1862 rendered heroic service protecting the whites during Minnesota uprising. Buried on Big Coulee Creek, 12 miles N of Wilmot, his body brought here 1926. Erected 1962 by Roberts County and State Historical Societies

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Joseph N. Nicollet Tower and Interpretive Center — 14 mi
  A tower on the edge of the Coteau des Prairies honoring the French mapmaker who drew this country in 1838 and 1839 and kept the Dakota names on the map.
• Sica Hollow State Park — 21 mi
  Wooded ravines on the edge of the Coteau, on the Lake Traverse Reservation, where the springs run iron-red and the Dakota tell of a good land gone bad.

More markers nearby

• Roberts County / Day County — 12 mi
• Stones from Log Flour Mill — 14 mi
• Map of Northeast South Dakota — 14 mi
• Travare — 14 mi