Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians
Phillip Martin, Tribal Chief
PO Box 6010, Choctaw Branch
Philadelphia, Miss. 39350
(601) 656-4031
(601) 656-7333 fax

The history of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians bears a sad resemblance to the stories of so many other Indian nations in America: From 1830, when President Andrew Jackson rewarded the Choctaws who had fought at his side in the Battle of New Orleans by taking away their land in the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, to the later years of the 19th century when most tribal members were more or less forcibly removed to then Indian Territory in Oklahoma, and on into the early 20th century when the tribe’s numbers dropped to less than 1,000 desperately poor sharecroppers whose status in the community was only slightly higher than that of the region’s blacks; and on into recent times when, as recently as 1964, the average Choctaw had only a sixth-grade education, 90 percent lived in poverty (with an average income under $1,000 a year) and more than 80 percent of adults were unemployed, the Choctaws suffered the same sorry state as most other American Indians at the hands of the majority.

But something unusual and dramatic has happened here, turning the latest chapter of the story into a potentially happy ending worthy of the author O. Henry: In 1997, the Choctaw Nation numbers 6,000 enrolled members, and it owns a thriving industrial park, a major shopping center and a major casino. Its enterprises employ some 8,000 Mississippians of all races and colors, and the reservation is dotted with quality homes, fine schools, an excellent hospital and quality nursing homes and day care centers. It is the major employer in what used to be the poorest county of the nation’s poorest state, and one of the 10 largest employers in Mississippi. Much of this is due, frankly, to the persistence and leadership of Chief Phillip Martin, a sturdy, charismatic leader and World War II veteran whose jet-black hair and energetic manner bely his 71 years.

Born on the reservation in 1926, Phillip Martin was one of the few Choctaws of his generation to have a high school education, but he had to leave Mississippi for an Indian school in North Carolina to get it. He served in the Air Force in World War II as one of three brothers to see combat duty, one of whom, Raymond, was killed in the closing days of the war, by eerie coincidence falling in action on the very day that Choctaws back home voted to adopt a constitution, opening their way to government recognition as a sovereign entity. Martin returned home in 1955 after a 10-year service career and soon became involved in tribal politics, being elected to the Tribal Council in 1957 and becoming its chairman in 1959. That same year, he led a delegation to Washington and began a campaign that led to construction of the reservation’s first high school in 1963; the following year, he took advantage of the brand-new Economic Opportunity Act to establish the Choctaw Community Action Agency, and established the tribally owned Chahta Development Company to build houses and the beginnings of a modern community infrastructure. Later in the ‘60s, they established the Chahta Development Company, secured a $564,000 Economic Development Administration grant, and broke ground on Martin’s biggest dream: A 20-acre industrial park. Reasoning that American manufacturers would beginning to look overseas for contractors but that they would rather “buy American” if prices and quality were attractive, Martin laid out a modern park with roads and utilities, got it ready to receive tenants in 1971, and then began circulating proposals to major firms. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as simple as he had thought. He would spend the next eight years sending out more than 150 proposals before getting the first positive response. It was 1979 before the first manufacturer, Packard Electric Division of General Motors, moved into the Chahta Industrial Park, taking up tenancy in a 42,000-square-foot plant that the tribe’s Chahta Enterprises built with $1.3 million in EDA grants and Bureau of Indian Affairs loan guarantees.

The first key to the park’s success, Martin agrees, was his persistence. It would have been easy to give up during the long years of fruitless selling. The second key was a little more complicated: During its first year of operation, the plant looked like a potential embarrassing failure. Its Choctaw workers, coming to the workplace with little but years of poverty and welfare dependency and little in the way of skills or good work habits, simply couldn’t produce automotive wiring harnesses in the numbers of of the quality that Packard Electric demanded. Some of the workers spoke no English; women workers had no day care and no reliable way to get to work.

With the Chahta Enterprises $1 million in debt and near bankruptcy, the Tribal Council was talking about selling off the facility at a dime on the dollar and getting out of the industrial business, Martin hired Lester Dalme, a General Motors supervisor and management whiz, to whip the plant into shape. Dalmer made some compassionate decisions and some tough ones, providing day care and transportation but also laying off some workers who simply couldn’t do the job.

Within a year, things were back on track, and the industrial park started to grow: Ford Motors opened a wiring-harness factory next door to Packard’s; Oxford Speaker Co. of Chicago opened an audio speaker plant. Other plants put together electronic assemblies and greeting cards. More and more Choctaws got jobs, and the reservation’s unemployment rate plummeted from more than 80 percent to 28 percent by 1984 and to essentially full employment currently. “Any Choctaw who’s able-bodied and willing to work IS working,” Martin said with pride. Moreover, employment wasn’t limited to Indians from the beginning. The reservation’s neighbors, both black and white, flocked to take jobs at the industrial park, and Chahta Enterprises is now one of the state’s 10 largest employers, with a total payroll of more than $84 million in 1994.

As with many Indian tribes, the Mississippi Choctaws made a calculated decision to add a casino to the economic mix in 1994, a development (featuring a 100-room resort hotel and three restaurants, with 400 more rooms, a golf course and a theme park on the drawing boards) that pumped a huge amount of additional money into the reservation and created thousands of additional jobs. Built under a management contract with a Las Vegas gaming company and its activities stringently supervised by a tribal Gaming Commission, the casino-resort attracted 2.5 million visitors last year from all over Mississippi, Alabama and beyond. It reportedly paid off its $72 million cost of development in its first nine months of operation, with additional proceeds going into a tribal fund to be used for infrastructure: Housing, medical facilities and schools.

Martin is at pains to note, however, that the tribe enjoyed a booming “pre-casino economy” and recognizes that the flood of gambling dollars may not last forever. That’s why they’re using the income, while it’s available, for projects that will last. Since 1966, for example, the tribe has built nearly 1,000 new houses on the reservation; a major hospital, a nursing home, a shopping center and a fine day-care center. The industrial park has grown to 80 acres, with nearly 500,000 square feet of manufacturing space. Capital investment in these projects amounts to nearly $100 million, of which less than $4 million came from federal grants. The tribe’s businesses provide some 8,000 jobs now, and the rates of unemployment and poverty have dropped to levels typical of middle-class America. Meanwhile, the average educational level of Choctaws has increased from sixth grade in 1975 to 11th grade, and only 2.7 percent of household income is derived from welfare and other social programs, primarily involving elderly and handicapped. The Bureau of Indian Affairs, which the tribe gently but firmly took over during the ‘70s by placing a respected Choctaw into the regional office as director, has now essentially gone out of business, leaving tribal administration in the council’s stable hands. (Another key to its success, many believe, in contrast with tribes like the Oglala Sioux where political rivalries have kept tribal affairs in constant upheaval and limited long-range planning.)

What’s more, the manufacturing plants that once nearly went out of business because their work was so poor are now routinely collecting awards for quality, like Packard’s “100 percent zero defects” rating and Ford’s Q1 award.

Throughout all these changes, Martin adds, Choctaw culture and spirit have remained important and in fact have strengthened and grown as tribal members won pride in their self-reliance.

And Martin, who once spent five years peddling his idea to 150 firms before getting a single taker, now presides over a large but modest office in the tribe’s office building, taking daily calls from corporate executives who want to do business. “Our products are our reputation,” he says, “and this has prompted people to come down here and propose work to us. We’ve done real well. Tell the other tribes, we can all do this. If you really want to do it, and get your act together, you can do it."

Department of Agriculture and Rural Development
Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians
Kirk R. Morgan, Director
PO Box 5010, Choctaw Branch
Philadelphia, Md. 39350
(601) 656-2070 or 656-9679
(601) 656-9599 fax

This Choctaw food and nutrition program brings together a number of activities that bolster food security for tribal members. Located on a 40-acre Tribal Farm in a rural area a few miles from the tribe’s headquarters, its metal building and greenhouse shelter a 4-H Youth Development program for youngsters, and extensive home-economics programs (ranging from newsletters and bulletins to frequent workshops) aimed at educating folks about nutrition and healthy eating, a particular concern in light of historic problems with nutrition-related diabetes among Indians. Kirk Morgan hopes to round up a grant to build a demonstration kitchen in which his staff can put on workshops demonstrating tasty and healthful cookery.

The Tribal Farm, with labor provided primarily by offenders in work-release programs and handicapped individuals in vocational rehabilitation, grows berries and “just about every traditional Southern crop,” the produce from which is sold throughout growing season at the tribe’s Farmer’s Market, which makes its wares available to WIC recipients and elderly nutrition-program participants as well as the public; they’re also working to encourage more Choctaw families to raise crops and become food providers -- four families currently do so.

Finally, in a growing community-gardening effort, this program will disk and cultivate individual’s garden spaces and provide them seeds as a way of encouraging families to return to the Choctaw agrarian tradition of growing their own food, with assistance from a USDA grant (hopefully to be renewed this year) that provides a horticultural expert -- the equivalent of an extension agent -- on a full-time basis with a bilingual (English and Choctaw) assistant.

All the feature stories on @GRASS-ROOTS.ORG's pages are reported and written by Robin Garr, a prize-winning journalist who has visited more than 500 innovative grassroots programs in all 50 states since 1990.

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