The Shoshone-Bannock Tribes

The Shoshone-Bannock Tribes website provides a substantial amount of information on many different features of their lives, from their history, to their government. They website also offers historical photos of tribe members.

Located in Idaho, the Fort Hall Indian Reservation is home to the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes, which consists of ‘the eastern and western bands of the Northern Shoshone and the Bannock’, previously known as ‘Paiute’. During the 1600’s, the Northern Paiutes ‘began to travel with the Shoshone tribe in pursuit of buffalo’ and became the Bannocks tribe.

In 1863 and 1868, both the Shoshones and Bannocks agreed to a peace treaty, known today as the ‘Fort Bridger Treaty’. This treaty was created due the strain between the tribes and settlers. Numerous Shoshones were killed by the settlers, this attack was ‘one of the first and largest massacres of Native peoples west of the Mississippi River.’ Thus the peace treaty was created.

The Shoshone-Bannock Tribe have developed through the ages, under the 1934 Indian Reorganisation Act, ‘they operate under a constitution approved on April 30, 1936.’ Through the establishment of the tribal government, they have become more independent and self-sufficient, as they have built up an economy and created a variety of tribal enterprises.

The Shoshone-Bannock Tribes of the Fort Hall Reservation