You've likely heard our friend Lane Nordlund on the radio or seen him on TV. He has the Western Ag Network TV reports, and he also does a "Montana Talks" Ag segment for us on the radio.

Lane shared a cool piece of his Montana family history in honor of Women's History Month.

As the world celebrates #internationalwomensday I wanted to highlight the first “Champions of the World” in women’s basketball. The 1904 Fort Shaw Indian Boarding School from Montana. My great-great grandmother Genevieve (Healy) Adams was on the team.
Lane tells us that his great-great grandmother was a member of the Gros Ventre tribe, and that his family still ranches on the land that was settled and then allotted on Ft. Belknap.
In the photo above Lane's great-great grandma is in the back row, second from the left.
They became World Champions at the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition (more commonly known as the St. Louis World Fair) by defeating basketball teams from across the United States and world.
I can’t image what these teenage girls and all the children from the multiple Tribes across the state went through in the boarding school. What the boarding schools did to native culture and its children is unimaginable.
Lane also talked about the discriminatory way they were treated at the time when they showed up at the Worlds Fair, then known as the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. Read more from Lane below. More info on the story can also be found at MontanaWomensHistory.org.

 

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