Native American elders from throughout South Dakota will gather at Mount Rushmore National Memorial Thursday, Feb. 21, to help reshape interpretive programs about the history and cultures of plains tribes.

Mount Rushmore Superintendent Gerard Baker, a Hidatsa-Mandan from the Fort Berthold Reservation in North Dakota, scheduled the two-day tribal elders' summit to seek guidance on improving Native American interpretive programs at the memorial. Baker began an outreach to tribal people in South Dakota soon after he took over as superintendent three years ago. He and his staff traveled to reservations across the state, an effort that eventually led to the Thursday, Feb. 21, summit.

"This is the first summit ever for Native American tribes from South Dakota at Mount Rushmore," Baker said Wednesday. "This is basically a listening session for us. We hope they give us some idea on what stories we need to tell about the tribes, how we're interpreting and not interpreting, what we're saying and not saying."

The elders will bring perspectives from the Lakota, Dakota and Nakota people statewide. And some will be asked to return to participate in cultural heritage programs at a small display village to be established at the memorial, Baker said.

The village will include three tipis in which Native people will explain and engage in quilt work and bead work and other cultural activities and answer questions about tribal life, history and culture from the public.

"We need to set up a schedule to bring in some of the elders so they can talk with people, with the visitors," Baker said. "What I've been finding in the three years I've been here is a huge interest among visitors in the American Indian history."

Baker also hopes the elders will help him make connections with young tribal members who might be recruited to work at the memorial. Some might also help with interpretation, he said.

"This is all part of a healing process, we hope," Baker said. "We still have some stories that are very hard to tell - the removal of American Indians from the Black Hills, the breaking of the treaties. We're asking how we should tell these stories."

Baker expects about 60 tribal people to attend the meeting, which will run throughout Thursday, Feb. 21, and continue Friday morning.

Contact Kevin Woster at 394-8413 or kevin.woster@rapidcityjournal.com