Author ORCID Identifier
Document Type
Thesis
Date of Award
5-2026
Keywords
Blackfeet, Glacer National Park, Great Northern Railway
Degree Name
History (BA)
Department
HISTORY
First Advisor
Dr. Donald Nieman
Second Advisor
Dr. Leonard Lederman
Series
Social Sciences
Abstract
The Blackfeet Native Americans have lived in and around Glacier National Park and their current reservation boundaries for thousands of years. They previously lived a nomadic lifestyle, but were forced onto a reservation by the American government in the nineteenth century. At the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century, the Blackfeet sold more land to the federal government at the same time the Great Northern Railway was building its railroad through the Rocky Mountains. In order to increase travel demands on its railway in the area, the Great Northern Railway lobbied the federal government to create Glacier National Park on the land the Blackfeet sold to the government. To promote tourism to the park, Great Northern Railway used the Blackfeet, representing them as relics of the past, drawing inspiration from the myth of the noble savage, enticing white Americans to see the Blackfeet before they disappeared. At the same time, the federal government was working to eliminate the very culture the railroad was capitalizing on, through forcing the Blackfeet to farm and raise cattle, abandon their old ways of dress, and ignore tuberculosis on the reservation.
Recommended Citation
D'Angelo, Edward, "Advertising the Noble Savage: Blackfeet Exploitation and Erasure Through Glacier National Park, the Great Northern Railway, and the Bureau of Indian Affairs From 1900-1920" (2026). Undergraduate Honors Theses. 58.
https://orb.binghamton.edu/undergrad_honors_theses/58
