American Indian architect leads aeroponics farm plan for Iron Range to Meda finals

Jan 25, 20210

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"The recruiting sergeant looked at me like, 'What is this Indian woman doing?' I scored so highly on the entrance test that he showed me a lot of jobs." Denise Pieratos, an MIT-trained architect and founder of Harvest Nation, started by four women who are members of the Bois Forte Band of Chippewa in northeastern Minnesota.

Denise Pieratos, who grew up on the Bois Forte Chippewa reservation in northeastern Minnesota, started her career after Tower-Soudan High School as an iron miner.

Recession cost Pieratos her job in 1982 at the former U.S. Steel mine near Virginia. She enlisted in the Army for the G.I. Bill in order to finance the college education that always had seemed a distant dream.

"The recruiting sergeant looked at me like, 'What is this Indian woman doing?' " Pieratos recalled. "I scored so highly on the entrance test that he showed me a lot of jobs."

https://www.startribune.com/american-indian-architect-leads-aeroponics-farm-plan-for-iron-range-to-meda-finals/600014608/