The Carlisle Indian School (1879-1918) was an audacious educational experiment. Capt. Richard Henry Pratt, the school's founder and first superintendent, persuaded the federal government that training Native children to accept the white man's ways and values would be more efficient than fighting deadly battles. The result was that the last Indian war would be waged against Native children in the classroom.

More than 10,500 children from virtually every Native nation in the United States were taken from their homes and transported to Pennsylvania. Carlisle provided a blueprint for...