There is a nice store in the heritage center with books, music and crafts on sale. His grave is in the cemetery that is attached to the school campus, which can be reached by a short 2-minute walk up the hill.

The school and centre are named after Red Cloud, a Sioux leader who attempted advocacy in far away Washington DC, in order to preserve the terms of the treaties with his tribes, and who played a big role in their ultimate transition to the pains of reservation life. The museum is small and includes the replication of a class room used in the past by the invaders to 'educate' native American children, a sordid reminder of the depths of inhumaneness to which we humans have the capacity to descend to. The paintings were by native American artists from across the land, and several were already marked 'sold'. Both were very professionally produced and of top-class quality, and the art was beautiful. The center has a museum, and there was an art exhibit on while we visited. The heritage centre is located on the campus of the Red Cloud Elementary and High School run by Jesuit priests, and feels like a dot of hope in midst of the expanse of the poverty-stricken reservation. One of the staff there who was an enrolled Lakota recommended it to us, and it turned out to be a really enriching experience. We found out about this place at the Prairies Edge store in Rapid City. So the short version is - Make sure you visit here and learn. The look on his face was of anger and hate. Even in 2015 I saw a cowboy delayed for a few seconds in a grocery aisle by an elderly Indian woman. He was important, but so were the others, including Indian Scouts and other veterans who served this country while being despised. Also be sure to visit the cemetery, and not just Red Cloud's grave. Look at the current school and see what today's students are doing in an effort to improve themselves and their community. While at the Center question and learn about the Red Cloud Indian School and its former life as a boarding school where cultural and language immersion and assimilation were policy. The Heritage Center is just one important place to start to learn about these things. We also need to learn about what led to the current state of affairs, what role we as US citizens have had in it, and what can be done to change things. We need places like the Heritage Center to learn more about this community, its heritage and culture. Our response is to put their fate in the hands of tribal government and the BIA - neither of which have ever scored high in trust or competence. There are extraordinarily high rates of teen suicide, infant mortality, alcohlism/addiction, diabetes, heart disease, cancer and malnutrition. They have over 80% unemployment and 97% of the population exists below the federal poverty level. It occupies some of the poorest counties in South Dakota and the US by household income in the US.

Pine Ridge is the size of Delaware and Rhode Island combined. I've needed to visit Pine Ridge Reservation for years not just to pay respects and see important sites, but because of what I first discovered when teaching a geopolitics course.

Ridge local cloud