Wahpeton Dakota Nation Community History

Excerpt from Report's Introduction, Page 8:

"The Wahpeton Dakota Nation is a First Nation community with a traditional territory that includes central Saskatchewan. Most Wahpeton members today reside on the Nation’s main reserve, about ten kilometres north of the city of Prince Albert. The region is on the cusp of the boreal forest, where plains and farmland begin to give way to stands of trembling aspen and rolling hills.

Wahpeton Dakota oral history tells us that the Dakota Nation has called this land home since time immemorial. Oral and written histories document the relationships the Dakota have had with other First Nations in the region, and with European and other newcomers through the fur trade, military alliances and conflicts, personal interactions, and encounters with the Canadian State. Although many First Nations could recount a similar history, the Dakota stand in a unique relationship with Canada having never signed a treaty.

This document looks at the many interconnected historical narratives of the Dakota in Canada, and considers them specifically in the context of some of the political challenges facing the present-day Wahpeton Dakota Nation in their relationship with the Crown." (8).