When the city of Mankato at some point takes up the issue of whether to rename Sibley Park, one issue brought up by opponents will be whether the park was named to honor Henry Hastings Sibley — the man loathed by the Dakota.
Sibley was the state’s first governor and the military leader in the U.S.-Dakota War of 1862 that led to the forced expulsion of the Dakota from Minnesota.
When I wrote about the the fact the City Council intends to take up the idea of renaming the park, several questions came in, including about a piece in The Free Press Dec. 13, 2020 from William E. Lass, professor emeritus of history at Minnesota State University and author of many books and articles.
One reader said the information from Lass should have put to rest the idea of changing the name of Mankato’s premiere park.
“The park was named for Sibley Mound. The naming of Sibley Mound predated Mankato’s founding in February, 1852,” and a decade before the U.S.-Dakota War, Lass wrote, citing numerous sources.
He said an exploration excursion on the steamboat Yankee in the early 1850s reached the Sibley Mound site, which had been called the Blue Earth Mound. “During the nearly 18 months from the Yankee excursion and the claiming of the Mankato townsite the mound was named Sibley Mound,” Lass wrote.
“Over the years successive generations of Mankatoans have been treated to the local legend that Sibley Mound was so named because (Henry) Sibley had once had a fur trading post there. There is no evidence for that assertion.” He said that during Sibley’s time as a fur trader he had a post at Traverse des Sioux near St. Peter.
In 1887 Mankato purchased 60 acres of land that would become Sibley Park. In “A Souvenir” by the city of Mankato Park Board, printed in 1899, it is mentioned that Sibley Park takes its name from Sibley Mound, not Henry Hastings Sibley.
So how exactly did Sibley Mound get its name?
An 1862 letter from Henry Sibley, who was then commanding Camp Lincoln in today’s Sibley Park, said:
“… my camp is pitched very near an eminence which is known as Sibley’s Mound from the fact that it was embraced in a land claim made for me, and without my knowledge several years since, but the claim was subsequently jumped by other parties as I never bothered myself about it.”
So while Sibley Park may have grown out of Sibley Mound, it appears the mound and eventually the park were indeed tied to Henry Hasting Sibley’s name.
A search online today shows virtually every source says Sibley Park was named for Henry Hastings Sibley, including the city of Mankato’s and historical societies’ sites.
On a related note, another reader raised his displeasure with the city’s decision last year to adopt a “land acknowledgment” that said in part: “We recognize this land was forcibly taken by the U.S. government and acknowledge the deliberate actions of generations that came before us to suppress Indigenous Peoples cultural and spiritual heritage.”
The reader wondered if that means “property owners in Mankato and surrounding area along with the city of Mankato are going to give back to the Indians all the land and property because Mankato says this land was stolen?”
Land acknowledgments have long been popular in Canada and Australia and more recently in the United States. There are differing views among Indigenous scholars. Some say they recognize and respect Indigenous people as traditional stewards of the land and are motivated by genuine respect and support for Native people while showing a willingness to continue to improve relations and understanding.
Others say the acknowledgments can obscure actual history, oversimplify things, are meaningless gestures aimed at “checking off” a political box and can cause more harm than good for Native Americans.
There’s no evidence the acknowledgments would lead to giving land back, particularly privately held land. There have been and are occasions where publicly held land that was previously promised to Native Americans in treaties has been returned.
The state Historical Society a couple of years ago transferred approximately 115 acres of land, about half of the current site, from the Lower Sioux Agency historic site back to the ownership of the Lower Sioux Indian Community.
Tim Krohn is at tkrohn@mankatofreepress.com or 507-720-1300.