For Immediate Release
Contact: Patricia Spencer, Public Information Officer
pspencer@lclibrary.org or 406-459-0614
THE LINCOLN BRANCH OF THE LEWIS & CLARK LIBRARY HOSTS MONTANA CONVERSATION “THE DAY THAT FINALLY CAME” WITH CHRIS LA TRAY
October 27, 2021 (Helena, MT)—The Lincoln Branch of the Lewis & Clark Library will host Montana Conversation “The Day That Finally Came” with Chris La Tray on November 2, 2021. The program will be an online webinar at 3 p.m. The presentation is free and open to the public. Funding for Montana Conversations is provided by Humanities Montana through grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Montana’s Cultural Trust, and private donations.
Montana’s Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians recently became the 574th Indian tribe to be recognized by the United States government, after nearly 150 years of trying. Headquartered in Great Falls with more than 6,000 enrolled members, the Little Shell Tribe is connected to all area Anishinaabe tribes, including the Chippewa, Cree, and Assiniboine people, and, particularly, the Métis, or mixed-race. La Tray draws stories from historians like the late Nicholas Vrooman and Verne Dusenberry to reveal the larger reality behind the “Little Shell” name, including how conflict with the US government led to the fracture and spreading out of what were once tight, family-based bands, their members often finding refuge on other reservations and marrying into other Montana tribes, like the Blackfeet and Salish people. The program helps people better understand who the Little Shell are, and their part in the history of North America.
Chris La Tray is a Métis storyteller and an enrolled member of the Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians. He is the author of One-Sentence Journal: Short Poems and Essays from the World at Large. His next book, Becoming Little Shell is coming from Milkweed Editions in 2022.
For more information, please call the Lincoln Library at (406) 362-4300 or visit our website at www.lclibrary.org.
-30-