Gideon Hollister Pond

[1] Looking for an evangelistic opportunity, the Pond brothers determined that the Dakota people, living in what is now southern Minnesota, would make an appropriate mission.

[2] Marpiya Wicasta (Cloud Man), chief of a village living at Bde Maka Ska (Lake Calhoun) in present-day Minneapolis, had requested assistance with farming, and Gideon took this role, intending to learn the Dakota language.

As they learned, they devised an alphabet suitable for recording the sounds of Dakota, and they taught this to their neighbors, thus bringing them the ability to read and write in their own language.

[2] Gideon worked for Stevens for a time, then, at the urging of Dr. Williamson, moved to the newly established station at Lac qui Parle, where Joseph Renville had a major trading center.

[5] As a result of warfare between the Ojibwe and Dakota people in 1839, Cloud Man's village relocated to a bluff near the Minnesota River in present-day Bloomington.

[2] Seeing the need to obtain credentials as an ordained minister in order to be accepted by his missionary colleagues,[1] Gideon returned to Connecticut for a time to begin the necessary studies.

About 50 men of the former Lake Calhoun village asked Gideon to perform the baptismal ceremonies, and his diary describes this moving experience.