Honoring Rosalie Little Thunder: Matching Grant & Memorial Walk

Published February 15, 2019

GARDINER, Mont.  —   On February 13, 2019, as part of our Week of Action, Buffalo Field Campaign and other wild bison supporters arrived in Gardiner, Montana, on the northern edge of Yellowstone National Park, to conduct the 2nd Annual Rosalie Little Thunder Memorial Walk.  This annual walk is, in part, to honor the sacrifice that Rosalie made in 1998, when she walked 500 miles — from Pine Ridge, South Dakota to Gardiner, Montana — carrying a Sacred Buffalo Bundle and praying to end the slaughter of her realatives, the buffalo.  We also walk to pray for the thousands of buffalo who continue to be captured and shipped to slaughter from Yellowstone National Park’s Stephens Creek buffalo trap, and who have are gunned down by hunters just outside Yellowstone’s boundary at Beattie Gulch.

They survived the Ice Age, but can they survive the U.S. Government?  Photo by Max Wilbert, Deep Green Resistance.

We began our walk at the Gallatin National Forest Gardiner Ranger District Office, where we gathered together, shared some delicious food, communicated our intentions for the walk, and then set on our way.  Banners and signs in hand, we walked through the town of Gardiner, into Yellowstone, passing the Roossevelt Arch, and on throug Old Yellowstone Trail, where we would pass by Yellowstone’s trap and end our 7-mile walk at the Beattie Gulch trailhead.  Walkers braved strong winds and blowing snow, but kept strong by holding Rosalie close to our hearts and reminding ourselves of the sacrifice she made, and also the sacrifice the buffalo make every time they walk towards Montana.