Judge blocks UND from changing nickname from 'Fighting Sioux' (Boy does this have a backstory)

[Are_grits_groceries]

BISMARCK, N.D. -- A judge has temporarily blocked higher education officials from changing the University of North Dakota's Fighting Sioux nickname.

The president of North Dakota's Board of Higher Education, Richie Smith, said Tuesday that the order could delay the university's efforts to join the Summit League and re-establish its football rivalry with North Dakota State University. Smith says he'll talk with the state attorney general about challenging the order, which was issued Monday.

The dispute has its origins in the NCAA's August 2005 declaration that the Fighting Sioux nickname and Indian head logo should be abolished. The judge's ruling came after a lawsuit was filed by eight Spirit Lake Sioux tribal members who support the nickname.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/10/AR2009111018794.html

Here's the rest of the story and it is a doozy:
<snip>
Here’s the history of the arena: Around 2000, Ralph Engelstad, an enormously wealthy Nevada casino operator and former UND goalie (who never graduated), offered something like $50 million to UND to build a new hockey arena and another $50 million to the school for academic programs. Engelstad had been notorious in Nevada (and fined by the Nevada gaming commission) for hosting Nazi-themed private parties. Not a great donor, but a big one. He is now deceased and a foundation looks after his strange “interests.”

At the same time, faculty and students and Grand Forks community members had campaigned to the President of UND to change the name and logo of the sport teams: “the Fighting Sioux.” UND at one time had been the Flickertails. It had become clear to that President that the university would suffer as a result of the continued use of this name and logo — frankly, because it offended so many Lakota, Dakota, and Nakota people as well as other American Indians.

But Engelstad changed all that by writing a vicious letter to the State of North Dakota Board of Education threatening to shut down construction of the $50 million arena. So that was that. The offensive logo and nickname would stay. Moreover, to ensure that UND would be sorely pressed if they ever did decide to change, he ordered embedded into the facility in all nooks and crannies the logo of the “Fighting Sioux,” ensuring that any change would require a complete overhaul of the arena. A massive F.S. logo fronts the building, reminding everyone of Engelstad’s impact on this small community.
<snip>
American Indians who show up often get jeered — or suffer the humiliation of “microaggressions,” where good natured (and bad natured) F.S. fans ask questions like, “What are you doing here?” Being an American Indian in a building like Engelstad Arena — and its two massive bars — full of drunken hockey fans who tend to dislike or even actively detest American Indian people (especially Indian students) is a deeply demoralizing and even horrifying experience.
http://turtletalk.wordpress.com/2007/10/13/ralph-engelstad-arena-the-fighting-sioux-epithet/

The Price of Removal of Sioux Logo From The Ralph

The fallout from yesterday decisions by the North Dakota Higher education Board to drop the Fighting Sioux Logo Nickname is going to leave someone with a big bill.

Under an earlier agreement the logos embedded into the granite floor would stay, but Engelstad Officials say removing the 18-hudnred logos from the outside and inside of the building would cost over one-million dollars and they won't be picking up the bill.

(Jody Hodgson, REA Manager) "The Ralph Engelstad Arena, nor the Engelstad family foundation will bear the cost of any changes, if any changes do have to be made, and we've made our partners at the University and the State aware of that."
http://www.kxnet.com/custom404.asp?404;http://www.kxnet.com/t/ralph-engelstad/376962.asp

The WaPo article leaves out a whole hell of a lot about UND and its mascot.

Nothing like a bigot acting from the grave.