Origins of Crow Agencies in Montana

Just over 150 years ago, Montana’s Crow Indian tribe signed a treaty with the United States government reducing their vast lands from 38 million to 8 million acres. Sadly, the agreement forever ended the Crow’s nomadic subsistence lifestyle they had lived for thousands of years. Yet despite the broken treaties, harsh conditions, and diseases (as well as being stripped of their language and culture), the Crow people and their leaders continued peaceful relations with the white settlers. Their story is detailed in Origins of Crow Agencies in Montana: Transitioning Beyond the Buffalo (The History Press, $25) by Patty Molinaro, which takes readers on an in-depth and informative journey through the lives of the Crow Indians from 1868 through the devastating 1880s. Molinaro, a University of Montana graduate and self-described aficionado of western history, uses vivid first-hand accounts and dozens of stunning black-and-white portraits of the striking plains people to relate their story. It’s an engrossing, well-written book.