“Too thick to drink and too thin to plow!” The Mis-souri
River from St. Louis to the Rockies was the high-way
traveled by the Corps of Discovery, led by Captains
Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, and thence on
foot and by horse to the Pacific Ocean. The Lewis and
Clark Expedition has caught the imagination of all
America in this Year of Our Lord 2004, two hundred
years after the event began.
The Center once again presented a June event (on
the 15th of the month) made up of three parts of history,
good food, and entertainment. Our program at the Oaks
Convention Center, with 250 diners in attendance, was a
celebration of the Expedition from the point of view of
one of the members of the company—Pierre Cruzatte,
one-eyed, half-French half-Omaha Indian, and the top-notch
Missouri River boatman. In real life Cruzatte is
Daniel Slosberg, Los Angeles musician, teacher, and
Lewis-and-Clark expert. Before appearing on our stage
at the Oaks, Slosberg had portrayed Cruzatte at such his-tory-
rich events as the opening ceremony of the Lewis
and Clark Bicentennial; at Thomas Jefferson’s home,
Monticello; at the Oregon State Capitol; at St. Louis’s Jefferson
Expansion Memorial, and at the grand opening of the Lewis &
Clark Interpretive Center in Sioux City last fall.
Slosberg’s presentation—in boatman costume and eye
patch—was an entertaining combination of music, dance, and
narrative. He talked about the bundles of Indian presents the
expedition carried, which included Jew’s-harps and fishhooks,
and then played the song “Soldier’s Joy,” with the audience
joining in. He recounted the frightening episode on the river
More than 300 attendees gath-ered
at the Thirty-sixth Annual Dako-ta
Conference on April 23-24 to dis-cuss
issues relating to land and water
use and depopulation on the Great
Plains. Among the 84 presenters were
12 students, including 7 Augustana
students. Other students came from
Brown University (RI), North Dako-ta
State University, and University of
South Dakota.
Among those attending the con-ference
for the historical marker ded-ication
ceremony for the Great Bend
of the Sioux River, sponsored by the
Minnehaha County Historical Soci-ety,
were 19 Patrick Henry Middle
School students, 19 of their parents,
and 2 teachers.
Environmental historian James
Sherow, of Kansas State University,
gave a compelling address about
Euro-American use and abuse of the
grasslands, and Robert Steensma, pro-fessor
emeritus at the University of
Utah, delighted the audience with an
insightful overview of the environ-mental
writings of Wallace Stegner.
A special component of this
year’s conference theme was the ses-sion
“The Northern Plains: A New
Frontier,” featuring members of the
Miner County Community Revitaliza-tion
organization of Howard, SD. The
session was assembled by Tom Kilian,
of the Rural Initiative Center, Sioux
Falls, and included a presentation by
The Center forWestern Studies Newsletter
Vol. 24 Number 2 SUMMER 2004
June Event 2004 Sails the Big Muddy
Making the Great Plains Greater
(continued on page 3)
(continued on page 2)
Daniel Slosberg portrayed Pierre Cruzatte, the French-and-Indian river-man
in the Center’s June Event production of “Pierre Cruzatte and the
Music of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.” The audience was thoroughly
entertained with his songs and antics.
South Dakota Poet Laureate David Allan Evans
was the keynote speaker at the Dakota Conference’s
Friday luncheon. His address, “Still Chasing
Chronos,” traced the theme of time in western and
eastern poetry, and he read from some of his own
poetry on the theme of time. His latest book, The
Bull Rider’s Advice, New And Selected Poems, was
published by the Center for Western Studies last fall.