American Indian Culture and Research Journal

The emergence of vertebrate paleontology as an established, scientific discipline can in part be attributed to large vertebrate fossils found on land dispossessed from indigenous populations from around the world. Specifically, geographic locations of the North American continental interior are known to yield fossiliferous stratagraphic sequences. I argue that vertebrate fossils are another natural resource dispossessed from Native peoples within the historical boundaries of Sioux lands. This body of research discusses the physical and geographical evidence of the first quarter-century of fossil dispossession in Indian country between the years 1846 and 1875.