Life is bare bones on the Lakota reservation

He also pulls bunches of long weeds in the prairie grass, to dry for use as a firestarter.

"I have to be careful," Hale says matter-of-factly as he pulls a few fistfuls. "Sometimes there are some snakes. Rattlesnakes. Nothing to mess around with."

He is 54 years old, aveteran of two Army combat tours in Vietnam, a member of the Lakota tribe and part of two stunning statistics, even as communities across America deal with the pain and challenges of recession:

The unemployment rate on his reservation runs higher than 80 percent;

Ziebach County, where he lives, is the nation's poorest, with just shy of 56 percent of its residents below the poverty line. Poverty among children in the county eclipses a staggering 70 percent.

After the Army, Hale worked 16 years as a firefighter. But he began having some back problems in the early 1980s and then, "cancer caught up with me. I have a brain tumor."

He says he gets a check for just shy of $17 every week from a tribal welfare fund, and tries to find odd jobs to pay for his food and to help out a diabetic sister.

But there's a catch: Tiny Cherry Creek has no such jobs. There are one or two one-room homes like Hale's, but it is mostly a collection of a couple dozen simple modular homes provided by a federal and tribal housing program. It doesn't even have a gas station or general store.

So Hale heads out most days toward Eagle Butte -- 17 miles up one road and then 21 miles more up the next. A few more twists and, "It's about 42 to 43 miles, someplace around there."


Read more about him and Res life:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/08/...omy/index.html