University of North Dakota

University of North Dakota at Grand Forks; state supported; coeducational; chartered 1883, opened 1884. It has several professional schools, including those for aerospace sciences, engineering and mines, law, and medicine. Noted research facilities include the Earth Systems Science Institute, the Energy and Environmental Research Center, and the Institute for Ecological Studies.

Dakota The largest division of a Native American group of seven related tribes, commonly known as the Sioux, who inhabit areas of Nebraska, Montana, the woodlands of Minnesota, and the eastern Dakotas on the fringe of the northern Great Plains. During the mid-18th century they lost much of their lands to the OJIBWA. As French and English fur trade increased, so did intertribal warfare, exterminating some tribes and driving others, including the Dakota, on to the plains. They raided the tribes of the Missouri River to the south-east, and also acted as middlemen, exchanging European goods, especially firearms, for corn, tobacco, and other produce. Traditional enemies and trade rivals were the CREE and Ojibwa to the north and east. In common with other PLAINS PEOPLES, the Dakota were nomadic buffalo hunters, who gathered in tribes during the summer, and dispersed into family groups during the winter. Before they acquired horses, buffalo hunting had been ecologically balanced; seasonal migrations were aided by the travois (sledge), pulled by dogs but later adapted for horses, and the tipi (Dakota for “they dwell”). Over-hunting with horses began to deplete the herds, further exacerbated by White people moving on to tribal lands and systematically devastating the herds.

Carolina Playmakers (Chapel Hill, North Carolina). This long‐lived company was founded in 1918 at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill by Professor Frederick Henry Koch who in 1910 had organized a similar group, the Dakota Playmakers, at the University of North Dakota. North Carolina proved a more fertile field for Koch's ambition to develop a writing and producing company devoted primarily to fostering a drama of native material. The company regularly mounted seasons of new plays, including works by young Thomas Wolfe and Paul Green. Many of the plays were published in the Carolina Folk‐Plays series. In time, the group was hailed as “America's Folk Theatre.” By the late 1970s it had abandoned its original program and had become a professional repertory company that presented native drama only on rare occasions. Today called the PlayMakers Repertory Company, it continues its association with the university while offering a season of professional performances.