The Otoe-Missouria Indians of Northwest Missouri

At one time the Otoes and Missourias, along with the Winnebago and Iowa Tribes, were part of a single tribe that lived in the Great Lakes Region of the United States. In the 16th century the tribes separated and migrated west and south although they still lived near each other in the lower Missouri River Valley.

By the 19th century, the Missouria and the Otoe had established permanent villages in Northwest Missouri, primarily erecting their characteristic earthen and bark lodges, but occasionally tipis were used during buffalo hunting season. Hunter-gatherers they hunted buffalo seasonally, going where the buffalo were, but they were always agrarians. They grew squash, beans, corn, and pumpkins to supplement their meat based diet. 

The Otoe called themselves Jiwere (jee-WEH-ray) and the Missourias were called Nutachi (noo-TAH-chi). Though they were two distinct peoples, they were related to each other in language and customs.

The state of Missouri and the Missouri River are both named after the Missouria Tribe, in a region where they once lived and where they controlled traffic and trade along the Missouri River and its tributaries. Trade was a vital part of Otoe and Missouria life for centuries. They traded with the Spanish, French and Mexicans for various goods. All three of those nations courted the Otoe and Missourias for exclusive trading agreements.

The nearby state of Nebraska also gets its name from the Otoe-Missourias. It is from two Otoe-Missouria words “Ni Brathge” (nee BRAHTH-gay) which means “water flat”. This name came from the Platte River which flows through the state and at some places moves so slowly and calmly that it is flat.

Following the Louisiana Purchase by the United States in 1803, the Lewis and Clark Expedition had headed up the Missouri River to explore the new territory. The Otoe were the first tribe they encountered, their population estimated at 500. Equal to the population of a small Midwestern town, that doesn’t seem like many people.

George Catlin, American adventurer, lawyer, painter, author, and traveler specializing in portraits of Old West Native Americans, estimated their population at 1200 in 1833. Lewis and Clark, and later Catlin, were making unscientific estimates. The small Indian population may have increased by approximately 700 in the thirty years between the two estimates, but we don’t really know.

In 1804 European explorers and the Otoe-Missouria Indians met at a place on the west bank of the Missouri River that became known as the Council Bluff, later to become Council Bluffs, Iowa. Lewis and Clark, official representatives of President Thomas Jefferson, presented the chiefs a document that offered peace while also asserting the sovereignty of the United States over the Indian tribes and the territories they occupied.

Unfortunately for all Native Americans, contact with the Europeans had brought them heretofore unknown diseases. Smallpox decimated both NW MO tribes and further weakened their hold on the region. The Missouria tribe had already lost many of their healthy warriors in warfare with other tribes and were to lose many more to smallpox. In the late 1700s, with few people remaining, the Missourias had gone to live with their relatives the Otoes.

The joined Otoe-Missouria tribe was patrilineal (based on descent through the male line) and comprised of seven to ten clans.  Each clan had a leader, and together the clan chiefs formed a tribal council. Tribal members had to marry outside of their clan. You can see how this was genetically appropriate so that tribes didn’t get inbred, but clearly there would be potential problems in the delicate relations with other tribes.

To white settlers from the east, the traditional territory of the Otoe-Missouria people was desirable farming land. As more and more settlers moved onto Otoe-Missouria lands they mostly took it as if it didn’t belong to anyone. Although a small tribe, the Otoe-Missourias fought any who attacked them and the white settlers who had squatted on the tribe’s land were seen as attackers. This created a conflict for the United States government, which took action to protect settlers. 

At the time little attempt was made to preserve Indian culture in North America. In a rare exception in 1834 a missionary named Reverend Moses Merrill had created a system to write and record the Otoe language. He published a book of Otoe church hymns (a white European idea as Indians didn’t have churches) called Wdtwhtl Wdwdklha Tva Eva Wdhonetl. The title of the book translates to “Otoe Book Their Song Sacred”. This book is considered to be the first book ever published in Nebraska. Despite minimal attempts like this one, Indian language and culture were increasingly lost as they were passed over by surges of settlers.