“Many of our people disappeared in the days of the early reservation. They went away to boarding schools, the army, jail. Some never returned. We didn’t know what happened to them. Spopee was the exception. He came back. But we still didn’t know what had happened or where he had been. Like our chief White Calf and our people who were confined to the reservation in the last days of the buffalo, Spopee too had been unjustly confined. Now, thanks to William Farr, both pitiful stories are told by someone who knows our history well.”—Earl Old Person, Chief of the Blackfeet Nation
“In this gripping account, the author tells the story of how Spopee was ‘discovered’ and rescued and reveals the plight of American Indians in the last days of their buffalo culture.”—Hugh A. Dempsey, author of Crowfoot, Chief of the Blackfeet
“Joining vivid prose and deep sensitivity for the complexities of this story, Farr pulls Spopee out of the shadows and into the light. He seamlessly integrates detailed, comprehensive research with the broader implications of the legal case, never losing sight of the sympathetic, yet flawed, characters at the heart of it. Blackfoot Redemption is a compelling page-turner and an essential book for students and scholars of Native American, western, and legal history.”—Sherry L. Smith, author of Reimagining Indians: Native Americans through Anglo Eyes, 1880–1940
"In this unique and well-written account, Farr uses a wide range of sources to tell the tragic story of Spopee, the ‘vanishing Indian’ confined to insane asylums for thirty-two years. In describing Spopee's experiences, Farr also tells the broader story of the U.S. government's harsh confinement of Blackfeet Indians to their reservation in Montana and of society's sad treatment of those it deemed different and useless."—Blue Clark (Muscogee), author of Indian Tribes of Oklahoma: A Guide
