Historically, American Indian education in the United States was inextricably linked to Euro-American colonialism. By the late nineteenth century, many Euro-Americans thought Native Americans were a "vanishing race," and schools for Indians incorporated this belief into their design. In the United States, the large number and variety of schools for Indians that sprang up from the late nineteenth through the early twentieth centuries were intended as a means to assimilate Native communities into the American mainstream, turn "primitive" peoples into "civilized" individuals, and create Christian citizens who would adopt the values of private property, hard work, and industry considered important by many Euro-Americans. This article focuses on Bacone College, a small American Baptist school for Indians founded in 1880 in what is now Oklahoma, and presents a brief history of Bacone College: its mission, students, curriculum, and early attempts at fundraising. The author explores the unique social and legal forces that shaped Bacone College from 1880 to 1941 and demonstrates how and why Bacone's fundraising efforts shifted dramatically during the 1920s toward an emphasis on the Indian identities of its students. She also shows how successful fundraising led to the creation of new campus programs that emphasize American Indian cultures and identities, and briefly discusses the positive effects of these programs on Indian students. (Contains 130 notes.)