Sandy Lake Band of Mississippi Chippewa

Sandy Lake Band of Mississippi Chippewa (Ojibwe: Gaa-mitaawangaagamaag-ininiwag) are a historical Ojibwa tribe located in the upper Mississippi River basin, on and around Big Sandy Lake in what today is in Aitkin County, Minnesota. Though politically folded into the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, thus no longer independently federally recognized, for decades, Sandy Lake Band members have been leading efforts to restore their independent Federal recognition.

Since the earliest of days, Gaa-mitaawangaagamaag, as the Sandy Lake is known in Anishinaabemowin or the Chippewa language, acted as a commercial hub in both east-west trade (via Savanna Portage) and north-south trade (via the Mississippi River). Originally, the area occupied by the Sandy Lake Band was inhabited by the Gros Ventres (Atsina) Tribe. Approximately 1,600 years ago, the Nakota Sioux advancing northward displaced the Gros Ventres westward. With the arrival of the Chippewa approximately 800 years ago, conflicts between the Assiniboine and the Chippewa pursued. By the time the French fur traders made contact in the Sandy Lake region, the Sandy Lake Band had near full control of the area's trade routes. By the time of the arrival of the European settlers around Sandy Lake, the Sandy Lake Band of Mississippi Chippewa became the instrumental tribe controlling the Savanna Portage trade-route that connected the Lake Superior and east with the Mississippi River and west. Sandy Lake Band became a treaty signatory to the 1787 British Treaty of Peace with the Dakota, Chippewa and Winnebago. Then starting with the 1825 First Treaty of Prairie du Chien, Sandy Lake Band became treaty signatory to it and other successive treaties with the United States.

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