Editing Flandreau, South Dakota (section)

==Early history==
[[File:Flandreau SD 1883.jpg|thumb|right|1883 illustration of Flandreau]]

The British established a [[Hudson's Bay Company]] trading post in 1763 in this area. Present-day Flandreau developed near there, with people attracted to the community because of trading business.<ref name=hogan>{{Cite book|last1=Hogan |first1=Edward Patrick |last2=Fouberg |first2=Erin Hogan |year=2001 |title=The Geography of South Dakota |edition=Third |publisher=The Center for Western Studies – [[Augustana College (South Dakota)|Augustana College]] |location=Sioux Falls, SD |isbn=0-931170-79-6}}</ref>

The town of Flandreau was originally settled in 1857, and named for U.S. Indian Agent [[Charles Eugene Flandrau|Charles E. Flandrau]]. (In the early years, it was sometimes spelled as 'Flandrau'.)<ref>{{cite book|author=Federal Writers' Project|author-link=Federal Writers' Project|title=South Dakota place-names, v.1-3|url=http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015027015455;view=1up;seq=107|archive-url=https://archive.today/20160916102847/http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015027015455;view=1up;seq=107|url-status=dead|archive-date=2016-09-16|year=1940|publisher=University of South Dakota|page=37}}</ref> Like other settlements in the region, it was abandoned within a year, as a result of threatening activities of the [[Yankton Sioux]] during the Indian Wars.  They were trying to expel European Americans from their territory.

In 1869, following the American Civil War, the area was resettled by twenty-five families of [[Christianization|Christianized]] Sioux from the [[Santee Sioux|Santee]] reservation.  White settlement resumed in 1872. When [[Moody County, South Dakota|Moody County]] was organized in 1873, Flandreau was designated as the county seat.

[[Richard F. Pettigrew]] of [[Sioux Falls, South Dakota]], a relative of Pettigrew settlers in Flandreau, promoted establishing an Indian School at Flandreau as part of what was his successful 1889 campaign in the state legislature to be elected for the U.S. Senate. The federal government authorized a school here, and what was first known as the Riggs Institute was opened in 1892. The Bureau of Indian Affairs took over a former Presbyterian Church mission school for the facility.

It has been known as the [[Flandreau Indian School]], an off-reservation [[Indian boarding school]] operated by the [[Bureau of Indian Education]] (BIE) (an agency established in 2006).