Since time immemorial, the native North American nations of the Great Plains have survived thanks to their cohabitation with the bison, turning their hides into tents, winter coats and blankets, using bones and horns as tools and sinew as thread.

In the mid-1700s, thousands of American settlers began occupying the plains, determined to exploit its natural resources. And after the American Civil War, the government of the United States of America deliberately encouraged its citizens to hunt bison in order to weaken the native populations of the Great Plains, and force them to live in Reservations. The number of bison on this territory felt from approximately 50 millions  to fewer than 1,000 individuals in just a few years.

Part of this organized slaughter enabled the industrial expansion of the United States, through the use of bison hides for industrial machine belts. A terrible moment in US history, both socially and environmentally.
 

More information on the bison slaughter in North America

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A video produced for Ted-Education by Atypicalist (formerly Boniato Studio).