RAPID CITY, S.D. (KELO) –Friday, President Joe Biden took to the podium in Arizona to offer an apology to all indigenous people who suffered by being taken from their homes and placed into boarding schools.
Victor Swallow is a survivor.
He was 6-years-old when he was forced to go to a boarding school in 1945.
“It was hard for me to talk about it. That break away from your mother and many many years I could hardly talk about it without tearing up and choking up,” Swallow said.
Native American Children couldn’t speak their native languages and had to give up their traditions.
“As again a takosa, a granddaughter of grandparents and great-grandparents that went to federal boarding school, was that they had to speak in secret,” NDN Collective Director of Strategic Partnerships Dr. Valeriah Big Eagle said.
Around 1,000 Native American children, if not more, died in boarding schools from 1819 to 1969.
“As sad as it is to look back, in this moment I also must reflect on the warriors, men and women, the matriarchs that have come before us that built the foundation that we stand on,” NDN Collective President Nick Tilsen said.
“Children abused, emotionally, physically, and sexually abused. Forced into hard labor, some put up for adoption without the consent of their birth parents. Some were left for dead in unmarked graves,” President Joe Biden said.
“This apology will fall on deaf ears unless it is followed up by real action. Action is required for healing to happen,” Tilsen said.
The NDN Collective is currently helping organizations teach the lost languages of their people for new generations as a result of these boarding schools.
