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The Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge: A Lakota Odyssey
Told through the voices of one family--the Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge, South Dakota--the true story of Lakota Sioux life chronicles four generations from Little Bighorn to Desert Storm on a journey of lost and reclaimed cultural identity.
388 pages, Hardcover
First published April 19, 1995
25 people are currently reading
748 people want to read
About the author
Joe Starita
4 books22 followersJoe Starita is a professor in the College of Journalism and Mass Communications. For the past 10 years, he has taught many of the college's depth reporting classes - classes designed to give students the skills to probe deeply into a focused topic while also providing some international reporting opportunities. To that end, he has taken groups of students to Cuba, France and Sri Lanka. Closer to home, he has co-taught a depth reporting class that exhaustively examined the pros and cons of corn-based ethanol and a legislative attempt to significantly strengthen state immigration laws. His classes also have produced two depth reports focused on Native American women.
Before joining the journalism faculty in 2000, Starita spent 13 years at the Miami Herald and served as the paper's New York bureau chief from 1983-1987. He also spent four years on the Herald's Investigations Team, where he specialized in stories exposing unethical doctors and lawyers. One of those stories, an article examining how impoverished and illiterate Haitians were being used to extort insurance companies into settling bogus auto claims, was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in local reporting.
Interested in American Indian history and culture since his youth, Starita returned to his native Nebraska in 1992 and began work on a three-year book project about five generations of an Indian family. "The Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge - A Lakota Odyssey" was published in 1995 by G.P. Putnam and Sons (New York), has been translated into six foreign languages and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
In 2009, St. Martin's Press published Starita's "I Am a Man: Chief Standing Bear's Journey for Justice," a book on the life and death of Standing Bear, the Ponca chief who, in 1879, unwittingly ended up in the crosshairs of a landmark legal case. That book was the One Book-One Lincoln selection for 2011 and the One Book One Nebraska pick for 2012. In July 2011, Starita received the Leo Reano Award, a national civil rights award, from the National Education Association for his work with the Native American community.
Before joining the journalism faculty in 2000, Starita spent 13 years at the Miami Herald and served as the paper's New York bureau chief from 1983-1987. He also spent four years on the Herald's Investigations Team, where he specialized in stories exposing unethical doctors and lawyers. One of those stories, an article examining how impoverished and illiterate Haitians were being used to extort insurance companies into settling bogus auto claims, was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in local reporting.
Interested in American Indian history and culture since his youth, Starita returned to his native Nebraska in 1992 and began work on a three-year book project about five generations of an Indian family. "The Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge - A Lakota Odyssey" was published in 1995 by G.P. Putnam and Sons (New York), has been translated into six foreign languages and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
In 2009, St. Martin's Press published Starita's "I Am a Man: Chief Standing Bear's Journey for Justice," a book on the life and death of Standing Bear, the Ponca chief who, in 1879, unwittingly ended up in the crosshairs of a landmark legal case. That book was the One Book-One Lincoln selection for 2011 and the One Book One Nebraska pick for 2012. In July 2011, Starita received the Leo Reano Award, a national civil rights award, from the National Education Association for his work with the Native American community.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews
August 26, 2012
Joe Starita brings his journalistic eyes, ears, mind, and heart to telling the story of a family while simultaneously narrating a tragic chapter in the history of the United States. He avoids sentimentality while choosing to face the grim parts of this history with unflinching courage.
The book leaves me with some confidence that I have come to the hint of the beginning of some understanding of the Lakota and their lives. I am left, though, to wonder about how the decision-makers in the U.S. government and the churches arrived at their positions and approaches to interacting with the Lakota. This remains, for me, the nexus of the tragedy, and its lasting, burning question: What is it about western civilization that leads its members to domination?
I would recommend this book to anyone who appreciates family stories told well, who desires to learn more about a chapter in history, and who hopes to gain understanding into the resilience of the human spirit.
The book leaves me with some confidence that I have come to the hint of the beginning of some understanding of the Lakota and their lives. I am left, though, to wonder about how the decision-makers in the U.S. government and the churches arrived at their positions and approaches to interacting with the Lakota. This remains, for me, the nexus of the tragedy, and its lasting, burning question: What is it about western civilization that leads its members to domination?
I would recommend this book to anyone who appreciates family stories told well, who desires to learn more about a chapter in history, and who hopes to gain understanding into the resilience of the human spirit.
January 16, 2008
This is an incredible history of Native Americans of the Northern Midwest, from the 1850s on - wrapped up in five generations of one family.
"The Dull Knifes"' tale of the Lakotas spans Wounded Knee from the massacre of 1890 to the armed stand-offs of the 1970s and beyond. The family has been a part of every American conflict from Little Bighorn, to both World Wars, to Vietnam, to Desert Storm. This book is really a chronicle of how a people have survived immeasurable hardships and found themselves and maintained their culture and identity in spite of all this.
I was amazed by what I DIDN'T know, since I consider myself somewhat familiar with the American Indian story. I never realized just how deep was the U.S. government's mission in the late 1800's to force a strong and independent people to become dependent on our government. I had no idea that it was policy to kill off the Buffalo to enforce this and accelerate the Indian population's starvation. I was floored to learn about the conflicts among the Lakota that saw their own leadership taking aim upon their people. Starita shares with us a remarkable family history, and with it, has documented many stories begging to be told and heard.
Read this!
"The Dull Knifes"' tale of the Lakotas spans Wounded Knee from the massacre of 1890 to the armed stand-offs of the 1970s and beyond. The family has been a part of every American conflict from Little Bighorn, to both World Wars, to Vietnam, to Desert Storm. This book is really a chronicle of how a people have survived immeasurable hardships and found themselves and maintained their culture and identity in spite of all this.
I was amazed by what I DIDN'T know, since I consider myself somewhat familiar with the American Indian story. I never realized just how deep was the U.S. government's mission in the late 1800's to force a strong and independent people to become dependent on our government. I had no idea that it was policy to kill off the Buffalo to enforce this and accelerate the Indian population's starvation. I was floored to learn about the conflicts among the Lakota that saw their own leadership taking aim upon their people. Starita shares with us a remarkable family history, and with it, has documented many stories begging to be told and heard.
Read this!
February 20, 2016
A really great look at Native American history from the perspective of four generations of Dull Knifes. This made me realize how much I don't know about the specifics of Native American struggles in this country. From numerous family vacations I have gotten a lot of first-hand education (thank you Mom and Dad!) which I have found fascinating, enlightening and disturbing. But I haven't read too many personal accounts of the devastation that White America created for Native Americans. A read I highly recommend.
September 20, 2025
Great story that allowed the reader into the life struggles of the people along with the diligence to navigate thru two cultures. Highly recommend for anyone who wants to learn about the history and reality of events.
March 28, 2024
I read this book for on my classes, highly recommend it to anyone wanting to better understand Lakota history. While this book does focus on the Dull Knife family there is also information about Lakota and U.S. history in general.
December 29, 2008
A multi-generational account of one Cheyenne family's life on Pine Ridge.
This is great storytelling. I particularly enjoyed the details of how many Lakotas and Cheyennes ended up working for Buffalo Bill in his Wild West Shows.
Those who like to read about the lives of Native Americans today should seek out this book.
Stew Magnuson
Author of The Death of Raymond Yellow Thunder
This is great storytelling. I particularly enjoyed the details of how many Lakotas and Cheyennes ended up working for Buffalo Bill in his Wild West Shows.
Those who like to read about the lives of Native Americans today should seek out this book.
Stew Magnuson
Author of The Death of Raymond Yellow Thunder
January 30, 2011
I learned a lot about the particulars of the Dull Knife family from this book. Most of the tribal and regional history I knew about from other sources, including my two visits to Pine Ridge in 1992 and 1994. Well-written with a nice interweaving of the personal and the historical (not that the two are ever all that separate).
November 29, 2016
Excellent memoir. Another account of how our country has betrayed Native Americans while showing the perseverance and survival of a whole people through the life of one family. Follow the Water Protectors in North Dakota and you cannot help but draw parallels of ignoring treaties signed in good faith by the Lakota Sioux then and now. We have not come all that far!
March 8, 2013
Loving anything that has to do with Native American History, this book was a pure pleasure to read. But even for those without a passion for Native Americana, it's a great book, enlightening and powerful.
December 5, 2016
A compelling history of the Lakota as told through one family's extensive travels. The chronology gets confusing in a couple places, and some of the digressions into the broader history are less interesting than others.
January 9, 2008
Even though I read this book ages ago, I still remember much of the narrative. It is about five generations of Sioux men who are descended from Dull Knife.
February 27, 2008
The history of a native family (multi-generational) and their problems with integration into America, good and bad.
A very good read. Non-fiction.
A very good read. Non-fiction.
March 4, 2008
My pops got me this book.
March 27, 2008
This is an EXCELLENT book. It has great history of the Native American culture in Nebraska/South Dakota. This is a must read!
October 11, 2012
A wonderful study of the experiences of three generations of Lakotas.
December 10, 2013
Wonderful story of the Dull Knife family. Take the time to study the history of our country through this family.
July 2, 2014
the history Starita recounts is difficult to read, yet important to know.
September 7, 2024
The Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge is a fascinating book and an excellent example of how authors can find interesting ways to structure a historical narrative. Dull Knifes was recommended to me by a public history colleague who knows a lot more about American history than I do, and I bought it for my father-in-law for Christmas some years ago. I came across it recently while staying with them and decided I should really read it for myself. It’s a very easy read, at least in terms of the writing – Joe Starita’s background is in journalism and he’s an excellent writer – but content wise it can at times be challenging and emotional. The Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge examines the lives of a single family of Oglala Souix Indians, highlighting one person each across four generations. In doing this it merges a wider history of the Oglala Souix/Northern Cheyenne with the specific lives of these men to create a work that is greater than the sum of its parts.
Slightly more than half of the book is dedicated to the first two generations of the Dull Knife family. It begins with Chief Dull Knife, a Northern Cheyene chief from Montana who lived during the Indian Wars – leading his people to a reservation in Oklahoma under threat by the US government before leading them back north in defiance of that same government rather than letting his people die in an alien land. His youngest son George Dull Knife was left behind on Dull Knife’s march north and ultimately was raised by members of his extended family who happened to be Oglala Souix in the Pine Ridge Reservation of South Dakota. As an adult George toured Europe and America with Buffalo Bills’ Wild West shows before returning home and spending decades working as a law officer in the reservation – subversively participating in and refusing to report traditional Lakota dances and rituals performed in the backwoods in defiance of US law and policy. While examining these men’s personal lives, the book also covers decades of racist US policy towards Indians in the plains and includes a deeply distressing and detailed account of the massacre at Wounded Knee. This stuff is hard but important reading.
The central framing of the book is George’s eldest son, Guy Dull Knife Sr., who was born in 1899, fought in World War I, and at time of the book’s writing was in his mid-90s. Vignettes of Guy in his nursing home during the present day are interspersed across the narrative of his family and even when the book moves on to discuss his son, Vietnam veteran and artist Guy Dull Knife Jr., the father remains central to that story. Again, the book provides a fascinating, and upsetting, history of 20th century US policies towards the Lakota as well as internal divisions within the Pine Ridge Reservation and the rise of the American Indian Movement (AIM).
I would happily recommend The Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge to anyone interested in a history of relations between Plains Indians and the United States’ government and military and the consequences of decades of deliberately genocidal policy on the people of the plains, but the book is also more than that. By focusing on this one family, Joe Starita injects intimacy into a narrative that could become overwhelming. You become invested in the Dull Knife family – not just the main male line but also their wives and daughters as well. When family members die or they suffer the loss of a good friend, you feel it. When Guy Sr. has to go into full-time care and doesn’t want to be separated from his family, it doesn’t feel abstract, it feels like you know them. This intimacy makes parts of the book more intense, but it also helps to blunt some of the more harrowing elements of the history. You know the Dull Knifes survive these hardships, so while Wounded Knee (both the massacre and the later standoff between AIM and the FBI) remains hard reading, there is a little bit of positive to consider – not everyone dies, the family survives.
In that way it is also a subtle rebuttal to the notion that the plains Indians, or any other native group, are dead and gone. It rejects the idea that America’s genocide of them is purely past tense and nothing that can be done about it now. It embraces the complexities of being an Oglala Souix in the modern era and while it refuses to be completely depressed about the future of the Oglala and their related tribes it also pulls no punches on what was done to them and the problems they face. The Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge isn’t just an amazing book on the Oglala Souix, it is an important portrait of America and what it means to be American – necessary reading for pretty much anyone who calls themselves by that name.
This review originally appeared on my website at: https://www.stuartellisgorman.com/blo...
Slightly more than half of the book is dedicated to the first two generations of the Dull Knife family. It begins with Chief Dull Knife, a Northern Cheyene chief from Montana who lived during the Indian Wars – leading his people to a reservation in Oklahoma under threat by the US government before leading them back north in defiance of that same government rather than letting his people die in an alien land. His youngest son George Dull Knife was left behind on Dull Knife’s march north and ultimately was raised by members of his extended family who happened to be Oglala Souix in the Pine Ridge Reservation of South Dakota. As an adult George toured Europe and America with Buffalo Bills’ Wild West shows before returning home and spending decades working as a law officer in the reservation – subversively participating in and refusing to report traditional Lakota dances and rituals performed in the backwoods in defiance of US law and policy. While examining these men’s personal lives, the book also covers decades of racist US policy towards Indians in the plains and includes a deeply distressing and detailed account of the massacre at Wounded Knee. This stuff is hard but important reading.
The central framing of the book is George’s eldest son, Guy Dull Knife Sr., who was born in 1899, fought in World War I, and at time of the book’s writing was in his mid-90s. Vignettes of Guy in his nursing home during the present day are interspersed across the narrative of his family and even when the book moves on to discuss his son, Vietnam veteran and artist Guy Dull Knife Jr., the father remains central to that story. Again, the book provides a fascinating, and upsetting, history of 20th century US policies towards the Lakota as well as internal divisions within the Pine Ridge Reservation and the rise of the American Indian Movement (AIM).
I would happily recommend The Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge to anyone interested in a history of relations between Plains Indians and the United States’ government and military and the consequences of decades of deliberately genocidal policy on the people of the plains, but the book is also more than that. By focusing on this one family, Joe Starita injects intimacy into a narrative that could become overwhelming. You become invested in the Dull Knife family – not just the main male line but also their wives and daughters as well. When family members die or they suffer the loss of a good friend, you feel it. When Guy Sr. has to go into full-time care and doesn’t want to be separated from his family, it doesn’t feel abstract, it feels like you know them. This intimacy makes parts of the book more intense, but it also helps to blunt some of the more harrowing elements of the history. You know the Dull Knifes survive these hardships, so while Wounded Knee (both the massacre and the later standoff between AIM and the FBI) remains hard reading, there is a little bit of positive to consider – not everyone dies, the family survives.
In that way it is also a subtle rebuttal to the notion that the plains Indians, or any other native group, are dead and gone. It rejects the idea that America’s genocide of them is purely past tense and nothing that can be done about it now. It embraces the complexities of being an Oglala Souix in the modern era and while it refuses to be completely depressed about the future of the Oglala and their related tribes it also pulls no punches on what was done to them and the problems they face. The Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge isn’t just an amazing book on the Oglala Souix, it is an important portrait of America and what it means to be American – necessary reading for pretty much anyone who calls themselves by that name.
This review originally appeared on my website at: https://www.stuartellisgorman.com/blo...
May 2, 2021
A story of a family originally Cheyenne and then Lakota from Dull Knife and the amazing flight he and his people made from Oklahoma back to their homes in the northern plains to the 1990s. A very well-done history of mainly regular people living on the Lakota reservation in South Dakota but with stories that range from Paris to Vietnam. The author and his interview subjects find some great stories (the time an orangutan counted coup on the Lakota warrior, for instance) and have a fine eye for details about what life was like for generations of the family.
It took me a while to get through the opening sections as they had a lot about the Cheyenne flight and the war crimes at Wounded Knee which were stories I already knew pretty well. The later sections about the family after all the famous incidents were much, much more interesting and evocative.
It took me a while to get through the opening sections as they had a lot about the Cheyenne flight and the war crimes at Wounded Knee which were stories I already knew pretty well. The later sections about the family after all the famous incidents were much, much more interesting and evocative.
March 4, 2024
A difficult but overall worthwhile read. It makes me, strongly, want to drive to the black hills ('bad lands') of South Dakota and visit all of the shrines and memorials to the Lakota Sioux and to the slaughtering fields of the aboriginal Americans because of such practices as the "Ghost Dance," the rationale of which was based on Christian beliefs but resulted in the annihilation of large groups of people (Sioux) as "Wounded Knee Creek" was on the Pine Ridge reservation. Won't say much more as it's necessary to read for oneself and then contemplate the enormity of what's happened to a traditional indigenous culture in the U.S. No more needs to be said.
September 8, 2022
Wow. Just wow. This book was an intimate telling of one family's history through some of the most horrific times in American history. It takes you into the life of the people and the times they lived in. All I can say is this book is a must read.
April 25, 2020
A must read...thought-provoking, educational, & interesting.
January 8, 2021
Truly one of the best historical storytelling. Sarita paints a very impressive biography of the Dull Knife family with rich research to details.
April 3, 2021
One of my top 10 books in my life so far
December 31, 2021
Much detailed, personal information on Little Big Horn, Wounded Knee(both of them and life at Pine Ridge. The Dull Knifes lived long and endured much
January 13, 2022
I love to read books written by journalists. I read Indian history in this book that I didn't know. Some of the settings here I am familiar with.
May 17, 2022
An important read and sorrowful insight into the history of the Lakota people and a reflection on the native American histories as a whole.
October 22, 2023
I tired of this book before completion.
September 27, 2024
Great book! This book covered in detail four generations of Chief Dull Knife. Very interesting reading.
May 26, 2025
I loved this one. It starts with the tragedy of Lakota chief Dull Knife and traces his line through the next three generations. Excellent description of the Lakotas' transition years from freedom to their adjusting to life on the reservation. Very readable.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews