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Misplaced Trust

Marty Two Bulls Jr. / Grist

These 14 public universities were founded with stolen Indigenous land. They're still profiting from it today.

The U.S. public education system was built with stolen Indigenous lands — and still survives on Indigenous resources. Using publicly available data, Grist has located millions of acres of land taken from hundreds of Indigenous nations, land that provides revenue to land-grant universities through fossil fuel exploration, mining, timber harvesting, and other industries. This series explores how stolen wealth continues to transform public institutions.

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Methodology

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Data and Code

Featured Story

The extractive industries filling public university coffers on stolen land
GRIST

The extractive industries filling public university coffers on stolen land

How 14 land-grant colleges took 8.2 million acres from 123 Indigenous nations.
Tristan Ahtone, Robert Lee, Amanda Tachine, An Garagiola, Audrianna Goodwin, Maria Parazo Rose, & Clayton Aldern February 7, 2024

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CREDITS

 

REPORTING AND WRITING

Tristan Ahtone, Robert Lee, Amanda Tachine, An Garagiola, Audrianna Goodwin

DATA REPORTING

Maria Parazo Rose, Clayton Aldern, Marcelle Bonterre, Parker Ziegler

PHOTOGRAPHY

Eliseu Cavalcante, Bean Yazzie

DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT

Parker Ziegler, Jason Castro, Mignon Khargie

ART DIRECTION

Teresa Chin

ILLUSTRATIONS

Marty Two Bulls Jr., Mia Torres

EDITING

Katherine Lanpher, Katherine Bagley

PRODUCTION MANAGEMENT

Jaime Buerger

FACT-CHECKING

Angely Mercado, Annie Fu

PARTNERSHIPS

Rachel Glickhouse

AUDIENCE DIRECTION

Megan Merrigan, Justin Ray

CARTOGRAPHIC CONSULTING

Margaret Pearce

ADDITIONAL RESEARCH AND CONSULTING

Teresa Miguel-Stearns, Jon Parmenter, Tushar Khurana

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We would like to thank the many state officials who helped to ensure we acquired the most recent and accurate information for this story. This story was made possible in part by the Pulitzer Center, the Data-Driven Reporting Project, and the Bay & Paul Foundation.

The Misplaced Trust team acknowledges the Tohono O’odham, Pascua Yaqui, dxʷdəwʔabš, Suquamish, Muckleshoot, puyaləpabš, Tulalip, Muwekma Ohlone, Lisjan, Tongva, Kizh, Dakota, Bodwéwadmi, Quinnipiac, Monongahela, Shawnee, Lenape, Erie, Osage, Akimel O’odham, Piipaash, Očhéthi Šakówiŋ, Diné, Kanienʼkehá:ka, Muh-he-con-ne-ok, Pαnawάhpskewi, and Mvskoke peoples, on whose homelands this story was created.