Tribes will no longer sell catlinite pipes at Minnesota quarry

Catlinite is a variety of argillite found as an aggregate of Sioux Quartzite; it's named for American painter George Catlin who visited the quarries near Pipestone, Minnesota in 1835 where Indigenous peoples have worked since at least 1637.

The rock is soft enough to carve with a knife and the pipe in accompanying photo is made of catlinite. In 2015 the Pipestone National Monument Superintendent sought input from several tribes on the sale of the stone to non-Natives. The Monument is still an oasis but now it's surrounded by glyphosate-saturated cornfields and overkill CAFOs.

Faith Spotted Eagle is chairperson of the Ihanktonwan Treaty Steering Committee and a member of the Yankton Sioux Tribe. She called pipestone “the blood of our people,” and said the decision to stop selling pipes at the monument is “a generational decision” that was the answer to decades of prayer. Formal government-to-government discussions among the National Park Service and Native American tribes started in 2013. It’s a complex issue; selling the pipes carved from pipestone supports Native American craftspeople, but others argue that the sacred pipestone should not be sold. The new policy was reached by consensus; not everyone was fully satisfied. Spotted Eagle said she’d like to see the sale of all pipestone objects — not just pipes — to end at the monument. [Minnesota Public Radio]

The Fort Robinson monument in Nebraska is inlaid with precisely cut slabs of red catlinite. It commemorates the life of Crazy Horse who was assassinated there in 1877.

Today, Minnesota towns like Pipestone, Luverne, Worthington, Lake Benton, Ortonville and Hendricks near the South Dakota border could reap the coming cannabis whirlwind as Governor Tim Walz urges legalization.

I grew up near Pipestone; the quarry is a magical place. https://t.co/9pNuRFGskn

— interested party (@larry_kurtz) April 9, 2017