Ovilla Azure’s industrial certificate from the Indian Industrial School, Carlisle, Pennsylvania, 1913. Jim Thorpe attended this institution prior to rising to fame in the 1912 Olympics. (Ms91-34)
The Carlisle Indian Industrial School was the first federally-funded off-reservation Indian boarding school. Founded by General Richard Pratt in 1879, it was intended to assimilate its students into American culture, believing they might thus become able to advance themselves and thrive in the dominant society.