Native American Cultural Center invites the public to Indigenous dinner

MINOT, N.D. - The Minot State University Native American Center and the MSU Native American Cultural Club, along with Minot State Student Affairs and the MSU Diversity Council, will host an Indigenous dinner as part of the University's 2025 Native American Cultural Celebration.

The Indigenous dinner, now in its fourth year, is set for Monday, Nov. 17, from 5 to 7 p.m. in the Student Center Conference Center. The event is free and open to the campus and community. However, individuals are asked to register in advance for food ordering purposes. The deadline to sign up for the dinner is Friday, Nov. 14. For more information, see the attached POSTER with a QR code to sign up, or sign up HERE.

Along with a chef-created dinner prepared by Sodexo of Minot, the evening will also feature live music and multimedia by Red Willow Collective, a community-based group that supports BIPOC artists.

"The meal is based on food of the Indigenous People of the Americas and music from Black, Indigenous, and people of color, no better way to celebrate the First Peoples of the Northern Plains," said Annette Mennem, director of the Minot State Native American Cultural Center.

National Native American Heritage Month started at the turn of the century as an effort to gain a day of recognition for the significant contributions the first Americans made to the establishment and growth of the U.S., and has resulted in a whole month being designated for that purpose.

One of the very first proponents of an American Indian Day was Arthur C. Parker, a Seneca Indian, who was the director of the Museum of Arts and Science in Rochester, New York. He persuaded the Boy Scouts of America to set aside a day for the first Americans, and for three years, they adopted such a day.

In 1915, the annual Congress of the American Indian Association meeting in Lawrence, Kansas, formally approved a plan concerning American Indian Day. It directed its president, Rev. Sherman Coolidge, an Arapahoe, to call upon the country to observe such a day. Coolidge issued a proclamation on Sept. 28, 1915, which declared the second Saturday of each May as an American Indian Day and contained the first formal appeal for recognition of Indians as citizens.

The year before this proclamation was issued, Red Fox James, a Blackfoot Indian, rode horseback from state to state seeking approval for a day to honor Indians. On December 14, 1915, he presented the endorsements of 24 state governments at the White House. There is no record, however, of such a national day being proclaimed.

The first American Indian Day in a state was declared on the second Saturday in May 1916 by the governor of New York. Several states celebrate the fourth Friday in September. In Illinois, for example, legislators enacted such a day in 1919. Presently, several states have designated Columbus Day as Native American Day, but it continues to be a day observed without any recognition as a national legal holiday.

In 1990, President George H. W. Bush approved a joint resolution designating November 1990 National American Indian Heritage Month. Similar proclamations, under variants on the name (including Native American Heritage Month and National American Indian and Alaska Native Heritage Month) have been issued each year since 1994.

Minot State and the MSU Native American Cultural Center have sponsored multiple events during November, including a porcupine quill and bead earring workshop that took place on Wednesday, and an author visit with Hunter Andes on Friday, Nov. 7 at 3:30 p.m. For more information on the author visit, see attached FLYER.