OCR Text |
Show Food, Minerals from Indian Lands Contributed Greatly to Victory The American Indian, his lands and his work were effective contributors contrib-utors to this nation during World War II, the Indian office in Washington Washing-ton has reported. The Indian office has supervision of nearly 57 million acres of land owned by approximately approxi-mately 300,000 Indians. During the war years, 1942. 1943, and 1944, agricultural products raised on Indian lands had a value of nearly $95,000,000. Livestock marketed mar-keted and consumed by Indians was valued at $51,570,000. Lumber production pro-duction totaled 1,600 million board feet valued at $7,000,000. While the amount of Indian-owned livestock grazing on Indian-owned land increased to a remarkable extent ex-tent during the war, there was less damage to the range than might have been expected, since during the drouth years the livestock population popu-lation ob the ranges of the Great Plains had been depleted and in many instances has not yet been fully restored. While the Indian ranges in the Southwest were exposed ex-posed to heavy pressure by the war demand, generally conservation practices continued and no permanent perma-nent damage was inflicted on any of the ranges which before the war were stocked only to their safe carrying capacity. The principal non-renewable resource re-source of the Indians affected by the demands of the war was oil. Under Un-der the stimulation of war demand, production was enlarged, new fields discovered, and the boundaries of existing fields expanded on a num ber of reservations. The estimated value of crude oil, dry gas, natural gasoline, butane, propene, etc., produced pro-duced from Indian lands during the THIS be-feathered Indian is Wilson Ware, a member of the Kiowa tribe, living in Oklahoma. He dresses this way only for ceremonial dances. The rest of the time he is a hard-working, modern American. war period, 1942-45, was $132,000,000. The other principal mineral output out-put of Indian lands was the lead and zinc ore produced on the Quapaw Reservation in Oklahoma. Production Produc-tion from this area during the war amounted to 415,000 tons of lead and zinc concentrates having a market value of $38,000,000. While there has been a tremendous tremen-dous draft upon the renewable Indian resources during the war years, it was met without irreparable injury to these resources and without undue un-due depletion of the non-renewable oil and mineral deposits. |