How Recovering the History of a Little-Known Lakota Massacre Could Heal Generational Pain

By Tim Madigan Photographs by Jaida Grey Eagle To reach the place known as Mni Tho Wakpala, the Blue Water, you drive west from the Nebraska hamlet of Lewellen, turning from Highway 26 onto a gravel road and turning again through a gate that leads to fenced pastureland. The ancient cottonwood, now known by the Lakota Sioux as the Witness Tree, still towers above the grasslands. Blue Water Creek cuts a crooked…