Founders
The vision that began the Constellation.
Standing Rock Community Development Corporation was founded in December 2016 on the conviction that culture, community, and self-sufficiency are inseparable.
Brian Thunder Hawk
Founder · Chief Executive Officer
Brian Thunder Hawk founded Standing Rock Community Development Corporation in December 2016, earning its 501(c)(3) determination in 2017. A Dakȟóta/Lakȟóta leader with nine years of demonstrated Indigenous community development leadership, he serves as a Sovereign Development Strategist across the Constellation.
He previously served as Executive Director of the Standing Rock Housing Authority — completing his tenure with a clean financial audit and leading the strategic relationship with HUD Washington, D.C. and HUD Denver, culminating in hosting the regional HUD conference in Bismarck, ND in 2016.
Today he leads strategic vision, partner development, fiscal oversight, and Constellation-wide coordination as Founder & Chief Executive Officer — a Sovereign Development Strategist guiding the Constellation’s three institutions.
Beyond the work, Brian is a father of six and has been married for fifteen years, and prayer remains central to how he leads. His purpose is clear: to help as many people as possible through the institutions he is building — an enduring Seven Stones Constellation created to serve Indigenous families and communities for generations to come.
Loretta (Grey Day) Bad Heart Bull
Co-Founder, Corporate President & Board Member
Loretta (Grey Day) Bad Heart Bull is a co-founder and Board Member of Seven Stones Corp and has served the organization since 2017. Drawing on her life experience and deep knowledge of the community, she advocates for the needs, priorities, and hopes of the people. Loretta is proud to have helped create an organization dedicated to strengthening the Standing Rock community and building a better life for future generations.
Two childhood experiences shaped Loretta’s lifelong commitment to service. When she was three years old and seriously ill, a Native nurse comforted her during her first visit to the hospital and made her feel safe, cared for, and loved. That experience inspired Loretta to become a nurse so she could provide the same sense of care to others. At age 11, while listening to a Tribal Council meeting, a council member encouraged her to pursue an education and return home to help her people. His words made her feel seen and valued, and she carried that responsibility with her throughout her life.
Loretta became a registered nurse and later earned a master’s degree in Public Health through a Bush Fellowship. Her career included work at Kansas City General Hospital, San Francisco General Hospital, Indian Health Service in Fort Yates, Spirit Lake Nation, and Sioux San Hospital in Rapid City. She served as a health educator and field health director and was a principal investigator whose research was published in two medical journals. Loretta is from the Porcupine District of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. She is a proud mother of three sons and grandmother of one grandchild. Her life and work remain guided by a commitment to serving her people and helping create a better future for their children.
In Our Co-Founders’ Own Words
Brian Thunder Hawk
Read the founder’s account of ten years of building — from the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Housing Authority to the Seven Stones Constellation.
Read the Founding StoryLoretta (Grey Day) Bad Heart Bull
Co-Founder, Corporate President & Board Member
When Standing Rock CDC stepped in front of a camera for the first time, in 2019, Loretta Bad Heart Bull spoke first. Before the mission, before the initiatives, before any talk of projects, she gave the organization its first public words:
“My name is Loretta Bad Heart Bull. I am an enrolled member of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.”
Identity first. Nation first. Everything this organization has built since follows the order of those two sentences — who we are, and who we belong to, before anything we do.
Loretta co-founded SRCDC in the aftermath of the Dakota Access Pipeline movement, when a handful of Standing Rock community members decided that the power they had witnessed in their people deserved permanent institutions. Alongside Brian Thunder Hawk, she helped set the four key initiatives — community development, food sovereignty, youth development, and language and culture — each aligned with a prayer way of life. Seven years later, that founding architecture still stands, grown now into the Seven Stones Constellation.
More of Loretta’s story, told in her own words, is being gathered now — and will live here when she is ready to share it.
Watch the 2019 founding documentary →