The Ponca Tribe

The Ponca Tribe of Nebraska places its people along Ponca Creek in 1804, farming and leaving on seasonal hunts. A supplemental treaty of March 10, 1865 moved their reservation to about 96,000 acres in present Knox and Boyd counties, back to their old burial grounds and farmland and away from attacks from the west. Three years later the Fort Laramie treaty drew the Great Sioux Reservation across the same ground, apparently with the 1865 agreement forgotten. The Ponca became trespassers on their own land, and hostile Brule Lakota under Spotted Tail added to the pressure that ended in removal.

What the plaque says

The Ponca Tribe This has been the homeland of the Ponca Indians since earliest recorded history. In 1868 the federal government signed the treaty of Fort Laramie, which transferred the land to the Sioux without the permission of the Ponca. Treaties made with the government in 1858 had guaranteed their land to them. The Ponca were forcibly removed to Indian Territory in 1877. Unable to adjust to the climate of the South, many died, including the son of Chief Standing Bear. In January 1879 Standing Bear and his people left Indian Territory bearing the remains of his son for burial in Nebraska. When troops arrested them, white friends came to their aid. A landmark court decision, Standing Bear vs. Crook, which determined that "an Indian is a person within the meaning of the law," did much to provide legal rights for all Indians. In 1977 Standing Bear was elected to the Nebraska Hall of Fame. A Nebraska reservation was eventually assigned to the Northern Ponca. In 1962 the reservation was terminated. The Northern Ponca were reinstated as a federally-recognized tribe on October 31, 1990. Ponca Tribe of Nebraska Nebraska State Historical Society

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Ponca Tribal Museum and Old Ponca Agency — 2.6 mi
  The Ponca Tribe of Nebraska's museum, powwow arena, talking trail and bison herd at the old agency near Niobrara, on homeland the nation was forced from in 1877.
• Santee Sioux Nation Museum — 12 mi
  The Isanti Dakota nation's museum and research room beside its headquarters at Santee, with census rolls from 1866, the mission school's photographs and a Dakota-language newspaper that ran for 68 years.
• Ashfall Fossil Beds State Historical Park — 23 mi
  A watering hole in Antelope County where ash from an eruption in Idaho buried rhinoceroses and horses about twelve million years ago, now uncovered in place under the Hubbard Rhino Barn.

More markers nearby

• The Sage Brothers — 1.7 mi
• Lewis and Clark Campsite — 16 mi
• Replica Bon Homme School — 18 mi
• First School in Bon Homme — 18 mi