Ghost Dance Movement: Topics in Chronicling America
In the 1890s, growth of the Ghost Dance Movement led to fear, conflict, and fascination. This guide provides access to materials related to the “Ghost Dance Movement” in the Chronicling America digital collection of historic newspapers.
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About Chronicling America
Chronicling America is a searchable digital collection of historic newspaper pages through 1963 sponsored jointly by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Library of Congress.
Also, see the Directory of U.S. Newspapers in American Libraries, a searchable index to newspapers published in the United States since 1690, which helps researchers identify what titles exist for a specific place and time, and how to access them.
Introduction
Inspired by the Native American prophet Wovoka, the Ghost Dance movement exploded in popularity amongst Native Americans throughout the country in 1890. Described by US newspapers as “religious frenzy,” conflicting reports about the intentions and amount of participation in the dances prompted the US Army to guard reservations, sometimes resulting in violent clashes. The extremely bloody Wounded Knee Massacre caused the Ghost Dance to fade in popularity amongst some Native Americans, but the American public’s fascination with it remained. Read more about it!
The information in this guide focuses on primary source materials found in the digitized historic newspapers from the digital collection Chronicling America.
The timeline below highlights important dates related to this topic and a section of this guide provides some suggested search strategies for further research in the collection.
Timeline
November, 1890
Reports of massive Ghost Dances appear in US newspapers.