LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Pipestone Region
built 640 days ago
The Pipestone Region is an area in southwestern Minnesota. The area was named for its supply of pipestone (aka catlinite) a type of limestone which local Indians carved into pipes. The area is ... noted for quartzite quarries. The area is one of several distinct regions of Minnesota.
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Numerous legends among the Dakota address the cultural importance of the Pipestone region to American Indians. A Brule Sioux legend, told by Lame Deer to Richard Erados, in Winner, South Dakota, in 1969, was narrated in the book, American Indian Myths and Legends. When the world was freshly made, so the narrative legend goes, Unktehi the water monster fought the people and created a great flood, whose waters engulfed the lands. Perhaps the Great Spirit, Wakan Tanka, was angry with his human children, for he allowed Unktehi to win, and the waters rose in wrath over the new earth. Soon everything was under water except the hill next to the location where the sacred red pipestone quarry is today. The people climbed up to save themselves, but it was no use.
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The Dakota were early inhabitants of the Pipestone Region. The area was part of the Louisiana Purchase and was settled by Americans beginning in the mid-19th century. The city of Pipestone was founded in 1873. The Pipestone National Monument was established in 1937.
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Less extensive use is made of the quartzite of the Pipestone region. This is a strong but easily worked stone which, because of irregularly spaced joints, is valuable chiefly for small decorative trimmings.
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