Post by Okwes on Feb 9, 2007 11:53:27 GMT -5
Plans under way for Sitting Bull burial site
STANDING ROCK INDIAN RESERVATION (AP) -- Two South Dakotans who cleaned up
the gravesite of the famous Sioux Indian leader Sitting Bull are making
progress toward turning the property into an attraction.
Rhett Albers of Mobridge and Bryan Defender of McLaughlin bought the site
west of Mobridge more than a year ago.
They formed the nonprofit Sitting Bull Monument Foundation and plan to
develop short trails and build a visitors' center at the site, with educational
displays on Sitting Bull's life.
"It will be a positive improvement for our community, our state and our
nation," Defender said. "People will be able to learn something and take it back
home."
Final architectural drawings are almost ready for the visitors' center, to
be built someday on the 40 acres surrounding the monument. A temporary
visitors' center could be ready by summer, Defender said.
The site resembled a dump when Albers and Defender bought it in April 2005.
Heaps of strewn garbage marred the grassy river bluffs around the monument,
Albers said.
"We thought it was a disgrace," he said.
The site's focal point is a bust of Sitting Bull created by sculptor Korczak
Ziolkowski, who also designed the massive Crazy Horse Monument under
construction in the Black Hills.
Sitting Bull, who was assassinated in 1890, was originally buried near Fort
Yates, N.D., in the northern part of Standing Rock Reservation.
Sitting Bull's ancestors moved his remains to South Dakota in the 1950s, but
some contend that the bones were not his. Part of the site's attraction is
the mystery and controversy.
_http://www.rapidcithttp://wwhttp://www.rahttp://www.http://www.http://www._
(http://www.rapidcityjournal.com/articles/2006/12/11/news/state/state02.txt)
STANDING ROCK INDIAN RESERVATION (AP) -- Two South Dakotans who cleaned up
the gravesite of the famous Sioux Indian leader Sitting Bull are making
progress toward turning the property into an attraction.
Rhett Albers of Mobridge and Bryan Defender of McLaughlin bought the site
west of Mobridge more than a year ago.
They formed the nonprofit Sitting Bull Monument Foundation and plan to
develop short trails and build a visitors' center at the site, with educational
displays on Sitting Bull's life.
"It will be a positive improvement for our community, our state and our
nation," Defender said. "People will be able to learn something and take it back
home."
Final architectural drawings are almost ready for the visitors' center, to
be built someday on the 40 acres surrounding the monument. A temporary
visitors' center could be ready by summer, Defender said.
The site resembled a dump when Albers and Defender bought it in April 2005.
Heaps of strewn garbage marred the grassy river bluffs around the monument,
Albers said.
"We thought it was a disgrace," he said.
The site's focal point is a bust of Sitting Bull created by sculptor Korczak
Ziolkowski, who also designed the massive Crazy Horse Monument under
construction in the Black Hills.
Sitting Bull, who was assassinated in 1890, was originally buried near Fort
Yates, N.D., in the northern part of Standing Rock Reservation.
Sitting Bull's ancestors moved his remains to South Dakota in the 1950s, but
some contend that the bones were not his. Part of the site's attraction is
the mystery and controversy.
_http://www.rapidcithttp://wwhttp://www.rahttp://www.http://www.http://www._
(http://www.rapidcityjournal.com/articles/2006/12/11/news/state/state02.txt)