Pawnee Seed Preservation Project

2003

In the 1870s, the Pawnee tribe was forcefully torn not only from their Nebraska homeland, but also from their traditional foodways – the corn that made up their traditional diet could not grow in the soil of their new Oklahoma reservation. Through the Pawnee Seed Preservation Project, founded in the 1980s, the tribe was able to compile their remaining heritage seeds. Six years later, they developed an ambitious project to send the seeds back to Nebraska to be grown. The program has been a resounding success. Now, the corn is sent back to the Pawnee tribe for use in traditional recipes and important cultural ceremonies.

Image credit: Health Policy Research Scholars