In 1884 the Genoa Indian Industrial School was opened in Nance County on the grounds of an earlier vocational training school for Indian children. This new boarding school taught reading, writing, and arithmetic, but its emphasis was on vocational training. Students learned farming, blacksmithing, carpentry, nursing, laundering, sewing, and cooking so that they would graduate with marketable skills and presumably be more easily assimilated into white society.
The school newspaper, The Indian News, as well as programs for school events such as graduation, provide fascinating accounts of life at the school and make clear the emphasis being placed on graduating students who had left their traditional culture behind.
Additional Genoa Indian Industrial School documents: