The 'Improved' Red Men and the Sioux Chief
A Seattle fraternal order debates the morality of posthumously 'improving' a legendary Indigenous leader.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Seattle Tribe No. 2, Improved Order of Red Men, held an interesting meeting last Tuesday night, at which was considered the propriety of adopting resolutions on the death of Colonel Sitting Bull, the ex-medicine chief of the Sioux tribe. Dr. T. V. Goodspeed, the author of the idea, announced to the astonished braves of the wigwam that Sitting Bull was certainly an 'improved red man,' and that such action would be appropriate. All Indians, he argued, when dead, were good Indians, and Sitting Bull had been very bad during his life and if, now that he was dead, he was a red Indian, he must be improved. The infliction of the doctor's pun did not kill any of the noble warriors present, and he was appointed a committee of one to draw up resolutions extolling the present goodness of the distinguished ghost dancer, and forward them to Mrs. Sitting Bull at Standing Rock agency.
“All Indians, he argued, when dead, were good Indians, and Sitting Bull had been very bad during his life and if, now that he was dead, he was a red Indian, he must be improved.”
This bizarre 1891 incident reflects the era's pervasive, patronizing, and dehumanizing 'playing Indian' culture common in white fraternal lodges. It stands as a stark reminder of how historical settler-colonial attitudes treated the lives and deaths of Indigenous figures as props for local social theater and dark, off-color humor.
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