Deserving of Recognition: The Fort Shaw Indian School Girls Basketball Team of 1904

Fort Shaw Girls Basketball Team posing with Trophy. [THM 2001.020.0002]

In May of 1904, ten girls set out from the Fort Shaw Indian School for the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis, Missouri. Their names were Minnie Burton, Emma Sansaver, Nettie Wirth, Belle Johnson, Genie Butch, Rose LaRose, Flora Lucero, Katie Snell, Genevieve Healy, and Sarah Mitchell. They had great talent for Basketball, defeating any team they played. Their skill had earned them a place at the Model Indian School that was to be set up at the Louisiana Purchase Expo. Besides sport, they practiced barbell and dumbbell exercises, playing mandolin and reciting “Hiawatha” by Longfellow. They also took examples of penmanship, embroidery, and beading from their fellow students with them. When they set out, they spent two weeks traveling through Eastern Montana, North Dakota and Minnesota, playing games against other college and high school teams along the way.  They arrived in June and began their five-month stint as part of an anthropology exhibit.

Map of 1904 Louisiana Purchase Expo, Library of Congress Image

The girls were kept at the Model Indian school on Indian Hill with roughly 100 other students. Near the school was a mini reservation, showing traditional housing and crafts, to give a clear comparison. Dr. C. I. Jones of Great Falls went to the exposition and commented, “I visited the Indian school building at the fair and saw the pupils there from the Fort Shaw School. They were undoubtedly the best there and the exhibitions they put up are the envy of the rest of the Indian Schools represented there.” Great Falls Tribune August 16, 1904. The girls played two games a week, Tuesday and Thursday against various teams, never losing. When the girls weren’t on the court, they were staged either in the school or the traditional housing for the fairgoers to view.

The Fort Shaw Girls Basketball Team in Traditional Dress. Left to right: Emma Sansaver, Nettie Wirth, Katie Snell, Belle Johnson, Minnie Burton, Sarah Mitchell, Rose LaRose, and Genie Butch. [THM 2015.095.0001]

Geneveive Healy in Traditional Dress [THM2004.007.0001]

Flora Lucero in basketball uniform, detail from image N20703, Missouri Historical Society

“Here at the model school, cooking, dress making are taught in the industrial parts to the girls, while carpenters’ and gardeners’ tools are provided the boys and the results are excellent in all these lines. … The administration of Indian affairs is doing its best to obliterate the painted, long feathered Indian of the novelist and make of that individual a law-abiding, good citizen of the United States and we honor the effort.” The Indian Journal, Dec 1904.

Despite being part of the display, the girls enjoyed their time at the fair, getting time to view shows and see so many things that they never dreamed of back in Montana: other countries, new inventions and so many different people. They continued to dominate every team that was put against them and were declared the World’s Fair Champions upon defeating a team composed of the best players in the state of Missouri. The news reached back to Montana and was shared in several newspapers, but never the front page. They returned to Fort Shaw mid-November to little fanfare. The team did go to the Lewis and Clark exposition in Portland, OR in December but once they returned again, the team was done.

“Since 1904 no games have been played by the team and its members have scattered. Minnie Burton, … is now employed as assistant seamstress and teacher in the kindergarten department of the Indian school on the Lemhi reservation in Idaho. Genie Butch is now at her home on the Fort Peck reservation. Rose LaRose is at home on the Fort Hall reservation in Idaho. Belle Johnson is at her home with the Piegans, Nettie Wirth is studying at an Indian School in Nebraska. Emma Sansaver is with her parents at Havre…Genevieve Healy, Katie Snell and Sarah Mitchell are still students at the Fort Shaw school” Great Falls Tribune, November 5, 1906.

The World’s Fair Trophy. [THM 2004.007.0005]

This story was unknown to most of the world until 1997 when Linda Peavy and Ursula Smith came across it. They spent the next 9 years doing research for their book “Full Court Quest.” A monument to the team was built at Fort Shaw and in 2009, “Playing for the World,” a PBS documentary was made. And on June 8, 2024 a celebration gathering the descendants will be held at Fort Shaw to remember these remarkable women who won the world.

-Megan Sanford, Archives Administrator