Amos Owen

Grandfather, I come to you this day in my humble way to offer prayers

for the thirty-eight Dakota who perished in Mankato in the year 1862.

To the West, I pray to the Horse Nation, and to the North I pray to the Elk People.

To the East, I pray to the Buffalo Nation, and to the South, I pray to the Spirit People.

To the Heavens, I pray to the Great Spirit, and to the Spotted Eagle.

And below, I pray to Mother Earth

to help us in this time of reconciliation

-Amos Owen, prayer for reconciliation

Amos Owen was a respected Dakota elder and spiritual leader of the Prairie Island Mdewakanton Community. He is fondly remembered for his efforts to reconcile the Dakota and non-Dakota people of Southern Minnesota, his dedication to working with youth, and his work to preserve Dakota language and culture.

Owen was born on the Sisseton reservation in South Dakota in 1916. He farmed an allotment with his brother under the Indian Reorganization Act until they both left to fight in World War II.

In 1958 Owen met Bud Lawrence, a Mankato businessman who was on vacation with his family near Prairie Island. A friendship developed between the two families and they shared their own cultural activities with each other. Owen and Lawrence went on to coordinate educational events for native and non-native youth through the Mankato Indian Guide Program. In 1965 they organized the first pow-wow in Mankato since the 1800s at the local YMCA. The same year Owen was elected the Tribal Chair of the Prairie Island Mdewakanton Community.

Amos Owen traveled to Mankato on December 26^th for years to offer prayers for the thirty-eight Dakota who were hung in 1862 following the U.S.-Dakota War. The war and mass execution that followed created a deep rift between the Dakota and non-Dakota people in the area. Owen worked his whole life to reconcile these differences. In 1972 he coordinated the first Mahkato Wacipi with Bud Lawrence. The three-day pow-wow commemorates the thirty-eight Dakota who were killed and is a venue for cultural understanding between Dakota and non-Dakota people. The event was attended by over 1500 native people. Thirty-eight eagles circulated overhead during the Grand Entry, a highly powerful and symbolic moment. In the following years the Mahkato Wacipi became an annual event and in 1980 the City of Mankato presented the Dakota people with a park to hold the Wacipi, the Dakota Wokiksuye Mokoce (Dakota Land of Memories). "Winter Warrior, a monument which stands outside the Mankato Public Library to commemorate the 38 Dakota.

Owen continued to dedicate himself to reconciliation efforts for the rest of his life. With his family he came to Mankato every year before the wacipi to speak at local schools. In 1986 he established an annual Memorial Relay Run from Fort Snelling to Mankato. The museum that held the remains of the 38 Dakota returned them to the Dakota people in 1987. Amos Owen gave prayers at the burial.

Amos Owen is remembered as a spiritual leader who kept Dakota traditions alive. He conducted spiritual camps for Native youth through the late 1970s and 1980s. He led weekly sweat lodges at Prairie Island which were open to people of all ethnic backgrounds and conducted ceremonies for people who were physically and spiritually ill.

Owen died in his home on the reservation in 1990. He is commemorated by the Amos Owen Garden of American Indian Horticulture at Minnesota State University, Mankato and with the City of Red Wing's annual Amos Owen Human Rights Award.

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