Stewart Indian School
Carson City, Carson City, Nevada
Marker Inscription
Stewart Indian School. Originally known as the Carson Indian Training School, Stewart Indian School was operated by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs to provide vocational training and academic education for American Indian students from throughout the West for nearly a century.W.D.C. Gibson, the first superintendent, renamed the boarding school in honor of U.S. Senator William Morris Stewart of Nevada. Stewart was the principal figure in obtaining congressional authorization and funding for the institution.In the early 1920s Superintendent Frederick Snyder initiated a building program at the school.Students worked with stone masons, some from the Hopi Tribe, to construct the distinctive stone structures that still grace this campus, which is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
Erected by Carson City Historical Commissionvictor O. Goodwin
The Story
Founded as the Carson Indian Training School, the Stewart Indian School was run by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs for nearly a century to give vocational and academic instruction to Native American students gathered from across the West. First superintendent W.D.C. Gibson renamed it for Senator William Morris Stewart, who secured its federal funding, and in the 1920s Superintendent Frederick Snyder launched a building program in which students worked alongside stone masons — some from the Hopi Tribe — to raise the distinctive stone buildings still standing on the National Register–listed campus.
Why it matters
Stewart embodies the fraught legacy of federal Indian boarding schools, institutions meant to assimilate Native youth that also became lasting places of Native community, memory, and craftsmanship.
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Related people
- · W.D.C. Gibson
- · William Morris Stewart
- · Frederick Snyder
Themes & tags
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