John Brown

John was a Sioux man of the Santee Sioux in Nebraska

The Santee Sioux Reservation, aka the Dakota Reservation on the map above, was established in 1863

The Santee (Dakota: Isáŋyathi), also known as the Eastern Sioux, were Dakota speakers and were just one clan, the Mdewkanton, Wahpeton, Wahpekute, and Sisseton. The Yankton, who spoke Nakota are part of the middle Sioux, including, the Yankton and Yanktonai, who were another clan, a different tribe.

The Yankton and Santee Sioux are part of the Oceti Ŝakowiŋ, or the Seven Council Fires, which also includes the Teton (Lakota) and other groups. The tribal lands of these groups extend from Minnesota to Canada and include parts of North Dakota, South Dakota, and Nebraska.

Santee Normal Training School (Santee, Nebraska)
The Reverend Alfred L. Riggs, a Congregational missionary, founded the Santee Normal Training School in 1870. The primary purpose of the school was to provide training and education to members of the Santee Sioux Tribe who had been exiled from their ancestral home in Minnesota following the Sioux uprising of 1862. The Tribe was first placed on a reservation at Crow Creek, Dakota Territory. When this location proved poor for farming purposes, with little available timber, it was determined to relocate the Santee on the Niobrara River in northern Knox County, Nebraska. In the summer of 1866, the Santee were moved to Nebraska, accompanied by the missions of the Episcopal Church, and the American Board of Foreign Missions.
Source: “Santee Normal Training School (Santee, Neb.) [RG2497.AM] - Nebraska State Historical Society.” Nebraska State Historical Society, 6 Apr. 2007, history.nebraska.gov/collection_section/santee-normal-training-school-santee-neb-rg2497-am/. Accessed 12 Oct. 2024.

Biography:
Born c. 1867-1868...

Attended the Santee Normal Training School...

According to the book Vanished in Hiawatha, author Carla Joinson identifies that John Brown was Sioux, admitted on March 9, 1909, to the Canton Asylum and diagnosed with paranoid, dementia praecox (Dementia praecox was a psychiatric diagnosis that described a group of paranoid and hallucinatory psychoses that could become chronic. It's now known as schizophrenia.). But it should be noted that she also states that Juhn was "released as sane at asylum's closing", which would have been by Dr. Silk some time c. September 1933.

"A forty-two-year-old Sioux man named John Brown was admitted to the asylum on March 9, 1909, suffering from paranoia and dementia praecox, an early term for what is now called schizophrenia. (In 1900 dementia praecox also implied an irrevocable mental decline.) Hummer examined him and noted several scars, eight missing teeth, and a samll external hemmorrhoid. Three years later he got around to giving Brown a psychological exam. He noted that the patient's judgement and reasoning were fair, that his ideation (the process of forming and relating to ideas) was slightly diminshed, that his self-awareness was good, and that he was self-complacent, indifferent, and well-behaved.
This was the only psychatric exam Hummer gave this patient during the more than twenty years he remianed at Canton Asylum under Hummer's care. The exam showed nothing that even hinted at paranoia or schizophrenia, labels that Brown may have been given before he arrived. Somehow, Hummer was satisfied with the exam and for the next twenty years never gave a thought to the misery he was inflicting on a man that his own examination had rpoven to be of sound mind."

Source: Joinson, Carla. Vanished in Hiawatha: The Story of the Canton Asylum for Insane Indians. University of Nebraska Press, 2016, pg. 100

"Families also misused the asylum. John Brown was a patient who displayed so few symptoms that the nurses and attendants at Canton Asylum did not consider him insane. Brown enjoyed nearly unlimited ground and city parole privileges and must have been both reliable and self-sufficient to a great extent. But his wife did not want him released when a visiting inspector suggested discharge, stating that he "might give her some trouble at home"

Source: Joinson, Carla. Vanished in Hiawatha: The Story of the Canton Asylum for Insane Indians. University of Nebraska Press, 2016, pg. 203-204.

"On Monday, September 18, Mrs. Brown, the wife of John Brown, who has been a patient at Canton Asylum since March 9, 1909, visited the institution. Dr. Hummer spoke to Mr. Moen on the telephone and told him he was sending Mrs. Brown down to his offices that she was the wife of a patient who would give him the information which he requested. About an hour or so later this woman returned to the hospital from Canton City, and stated that she wished to talk to me. She had apparently been coached by somebody, and she proceeded to act as a lawyer in behalf of the other Indians, putting a lot of questions to me, such as, why the patients were being moved, saying that the Indians were well satisfied with their treatment, that Dr. Hummer was a very good doctor, that when the patients were moved their relatives would be unable to visit them. When told that this decision was made by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs and not by me, she wanted to know why I could not write to the commissioner, telling him that this was a nice place. I told her that I could not discuss with her the medical defects of the institution, but that as far as she herself was concerned I was quite sure her husband could be discharged into her care; and I frankly told her that in my opinion this man was not insane and had not been so for many years. However, she said she did not want her husband discharged, saying that although he might be getting along all right in the hospital, he might give her some trouble at home. Dr. Hummer at this point intervened, saying he did not agree with me, that in his opinion "Mr. Brown is now (after a residence of 24 years), slightly deteriorated and in need of the guidance which this institution gives him." It should be added that Brown is a patient who has had ground and city parole for many years, and the nurses and other employees speak of him as not insane; also, when I visited the Canton hospital in 1929 I was told that this patient could leave that institution any time he wished."

Source: Silk, Asylum for Insane Indians, September 1933, 6 and cover letter addressed to commissioner of Indian affairs, October 3, 1933

Mr. Brown was however NOT transferred to St. Elizabeths Hospital as he is not on the list provided by Carla Joinson, but appears to have been discharged...

His profile is part of the https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Space:Canton_Asylum.

Research Notes:
-John Brown was in the Canton Asylum from c. 1909 until 1933 when it closed.
__________
Sources:

1910 May 13 - "United States Census, 1910", , FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MPFS-XKR : Sun Mar 10 10:01:59 UTC 2024), Entry for John Brown, 1910, pg. 83/1082, line 14 (age 43, Inmate from Minnesota), census of the United States Indian Insane Asylum, Canton Township, Lincoln County, South Dakota

1910 Jul 2 - Harry R. Hummer; Hummer, Harry R., “1910 Census Roll,” Honoring the Dead: A Digital Archive of the Insane Indian Asylum, accessed October 12, 2024, https://honoringthedead.omeka.net/items/show/3, pg. 2 4. Brown, John, 43. Male. Married.

• ***1911

1920 Jan 30 - "United States Census, 1920", , FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:M6J7-FXG : Sun Mar 10 07:40:46 UTC 2024), Entry for John Brown, 1920, pg. 651/1130, line 25 (age 52), census of the Asylum for Indians, Canton Township, Lincoln County, South Dakota

• ***1921

1922 Jun 30 - Camp Verde School: 1910-27; Canton Insane Asylum: 1910-22, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155854182?objectPage=1041, line 1, Canton Asylum male census

1923 Jun 30 - Canton Insane Asylum: 1923-33; Cantonment School, pg. 370/1140: 1910-27, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports 1910 – 1935, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155855298?objectPage=031, line 1, Canton Asylum male census

• ***1924

1925 Jun 30 - Canton Insane Asylum: 1923-33; Cantonment School, pg. 370/1140: 1910-27, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports 1910 – 1935, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155855298?objectPage=116, line 3, Canton Asylum male census

1926 Jun 30 - Canton Insane Asylum: 1923-33; Cantonment School, pg. 370/1140: 1910-27, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports 1910 – 1935, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155855298?objectPage=167, line 3, Canton Asylum male census

1927 Jun 30 - Canton Insane Asylum: 1923-33; Cantonment School, pg. 370/1140: 1910-27, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports 1910 – 1935, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155855298?objectPage=185, line 4, Canton Asylum male census

1928 Jun 30 - Canton Insane Asylum: 1923-33; Cantonment School, pg. 370/1140: 1910-27, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports 1910 – 1935, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155855298?objectPage=210, line 3, Canton Asylum male census

1929 Jun 30 - Canton Insane Asylum: 1923-33; Cantonment School, pg. 370/1140: 1910-27, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports 1910 – 1935, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155855298?objectPage=328, line 3, Canton Asylum male census

???1930 Apr 1 - "United States, Native American, Census Rolls, 1885-1940", , FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:WW71-RDW2 : Sun Mar 10 20:53:22 UTC 2024), Entry for John Brown, 1930, pg. 179/493, line 248 (age 66, widowed @ Canton Asylum, Yankton tribe?), census of the Ynakton Reservation, Yankton jurisdiction, South Dakota

1930 Apr 7 - "United States Census, 1930", , FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XQVZ-1N5 : Sun Jul 07 00:55:40 UTC 2024), Entry for John Brown, 1930, pg. 610/1062, line 3 (age 62 Inmate from Nebraska), census of the Asylum for Insane Indians, Canton Township, Lincoln County, South Dakota

1930 Jun 30 - Canton Insane Asylum: 1923-33; Cantonment School, pg. 370/1140: 1910-27, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports 1910 – 1935, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155855298?objectPage=350, line 3, Canton Asylum male census

1931 Jun 30 - Canton Insane Asylum: 1923-33; Cantonment School, pg. 370/1140: 1910-27, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports 1910 – 1935, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155855298?objectPage=370, line 4, Canton Asylum male census

1932 Jun 30 - Canton Insane Asylum: 1923-33; Cantonment School, pg. 370/1140: 1910-27, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports 1910 – 1935, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155855298?objectPage=390, line 3, Canton Asylum male census

1933 Jun 30 - Canton Insane Asylum: 1923-33; Cantonment School, pg. 370/1140: 1910-27, Series: Superintendents' Annual Narrative and Statistical Reports 1910 – 1935, Record Group 75: Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 7th and Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC, 20408 @ https://catalog.archives.gov/id/155855298?objectPage=427, line 3, Canton Asylum male census