NOTICE: This is a virtual event conducted over Zoom. The link to the virtual presentation can be found below.

Learn about the complexities of Dakota resilience and survival after their retreat and removal from traditional lands in the midwest and Iowa. Follow the Dakota story after their events in Spirit Lake in March of 1857 and beyond. Learn about the rise of military leaders within Dakota tribes connecting the events at Spirit Lake, IA to the Battle of the Little Bighorn (Battle of the Greasy Grass). Find out why the contemporary Dakota Diaspora spreads wide across the midwest and even into Canada.

James A. M. Ritchie is a retired historical consultant based in
Manitoba, Canada. As a news reporter or as consultant he has worked with a score of aboriginal communities in central Canada and the American midwest over 50 years. He is the author of a score of reports for aboriginal local governments on heritage and constitutional issues, and a half dozen historical books primarily on the Dakota meant for educators and general audiences. He was a volunteer consultant on the Inkpaduta Water Trail project and is currently a volunteer advisor on heritage issues with the Dakota Nations of Manitoba.

James Ritchie

This virtual event will be hosted by Environmental Historian Kevin Mason. Dr. Mason is a rural and environmental historian of the American Midwest. After earning his PhD at Iowa State University, he served as an Associate Professor of History at Waldorf University. Mason will join the University of Northern Iowa in fall 2025 as an Assistant Professor of History. Mason also runs the digital humanities project Notes on Iowa, serves on the Board of Directors for Humanities Iowa, and serves on the Board of Trustees for the State Historical Society of Iowa. An award-winning author, Mason's forthcoming book Fields of Change: The 1st United States Dragoons and Iowa's Environmental Transformation is due out on Michigan State University Press in 2026.

Dr. Kevin Mason