I remember staying with my grandparents Bernard Flood Sr. and Ada Little Money Flood in O`Kreek, South Dakota as a small boy. My grandparents didn’t have electricity, running water or plumbing until 1977. They gave me an invaluable gift, instead of sitting in front of a T.V or listening to music from an I Pod, they shared the history of our people and the greatness of our leaders and holy men from stories passed down throughout time. I would sit back and listen to all they shared and tried to imagine how the man they spoke about looked, what caliber of man he was and what his voice sounded like. I am a non-traditional student here at the University of South Dakota, and I have been awarded work study hours in the South Dakota Oral History Center. With work study I was given exactly what I had wondered about as a small boy, the gift to hear the voices, thoughts, and view the images of our holy people and great warrior leaders, all from the taped recordings, written interviews, and photos that are in the collection of the Oral History Center.
In our tribal history we have lost a lot of our customs, spiritual ways and our languages brought about from the Boarding School experience and the “Kill the Indian, save the man” mentality. I was born in 1962 and saw and felt the loss of tribal identity and languages from some of the major influences around me, all from the brain washing from these government schools. Our people today have a different mindset and have brought our ways, languages and thought process back to a renewed sense of pride and also- power. The voices and images from the Oral History Center here at U.S.D. will forever immortalize our great ones and a new generation and the world will be exposed to the wisdom and intelligence of our warrior ancestors from the invaluable work of the Oral History Center, and the wonderful staff I now speak of. Native America owes the South Dakota Oral History Center and staff a debt of immense gratitude.
The Oral History Center, located here at U.S.D. in Vermillion South Dakota, was started in the late 1960s with a grant from the Doris Duke Foundation; the Foundation gave money to six United States Universities to record the culture and experiences of Native Americans. This project, at the Oral History Center, is known as the American Indian Research Project and it contains over 2,000 recordings from the indigenous peoples of the Northern Plains. In the 1970s the South Dakota State Legislature funded the South Dakota Oral History Project which contains over 3,000 recordings detailing the various cultures of South Dakota. The Oral History Center also has the James Emery Collection, Stanislaus Maudlin Collection, and the John Painter Collections which were projects done by independent researchers on various subjects. Beyond recordings the Center has a collection of photographs that is currently being cataloged as well as the Joseph Cash Memorial Library with over a thousand books concerning the Northern Plains. The Cash Library is also currently being cataloged to make it more accessible to researchers. The Oral History Center employs two GA positions and multiple work study positions to complete their projects and to ensure that their collections improve in accessibility. The Center also has an Internship Program that strives to add to student’s academic experience by introducing them to oral history and the operations of an archive.
Jennifer McIntyre who is the Digitizer/Curator for the South Dakota Oral History Century is from the Sioux Falls area and received her undergraduate degree in History and International Studies from the University of South Dakota. After getting her bachelor’s degree she went to Arcadia University in Pennsylvania and received a Master’s Degree in International Peace and Conflict Resolution. Jennifer’s Master’s thesis was titled “Indigenous Peoples and Self-Determination” and explored the movements of different indigenous groups to assert self-determination rights on the national and international stage. Working at the Oral History Center combines many of her interests in the history field, preservation of history, and also in the experiences of Indigenous peoples. Jennifer feels the Oral History Center is an invaluable institution because it gives to all a history of the everyday person in their own words, and is unlike any form of history that a researcher can use. To her, “the Oral History Center preserves the voices, lessons, and stories of our ancestors and its responsibility to those voices, ensures that future generations will be able to access this very personal narrative of our past.”
Jessica Neal is the Cataloger/Curator. She graduated from the University of South Dakota in 2007 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in History and Anthropology, focusing on Archaeology. As a student, she gained experience in archival preservation while working in the Archives and Special collections of the University library. Upon graduating, she began an Archaeological career, first working for Current Archaeological Research in Rock Springs, Wyoming, and then for the Augustana College Archaeology Lab in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Since coming to the SDOHC in 2010, she has expanded her archival preservation knowledge, and learned cataloging skills. Her professional interests are Medieval History and Northern Plains History. She states that “The Oral History Center houses stories from individuals about how the Northern Plains became what they are today. You can’t find these stories anywhere else- they are the day-to-day stories that won’t be included in textbooks. Once their narrator passes on, there is a good chance that their life tales would disappear completely, with time, without their voices being preserved in these reels. It may be cliché, but you really can’t know who you are, without knowing where you came from. The Oral History Center is an avenue to knowing our past, and to knowing ourselves.”
I am at a loss for words to define the importance of what I feel about these wonderful ladies and their work, and how to show the gratefulness I feel as a Native American to know the voices, wisdom, and images of our former leaders and holy men are on tape to be heard and immortalized for future generations to follow. If you are a Native American History buff this archive has a wealth of knowledge that you won`t find anywhere else. The most important thing for me is the truth on these tapes, the truth and wisdom from the men and women who led us when our old way of life was coming to an end and survival for us as a people, very uncertain. I have been in various history classes as a student and listened to our old way of life being portrayed lacking truth, and without any real resemblance to the beautiful people and immense warrior power we were known for. The biggest gift we as a Native people could give ourselves is to gather our writers together, examine this wonderful source of information from a Native American perspective and write a History book from our own words, and get it sanctioned for an educational format and share the Native American experience with the world in our own words. The proof of our way of life and thinking- process is in this archive. I want to say Wopila Tanka to Jennifer McIntyre and Jessica Neal for ensuring accuracy in transcribing these interviews and the painstaking work involved, and for having the love and compassion for our history and people, the beautiful people who once roamed these plains with warrior pride.
Pilamaya, Corey Flood.
To request or donate materials please email the South Dakota Oral History Center at