As a child, Sven Black Eagle spent many hours at his father's knee, usually tripping him and sending him sprawling. It was after one such mishap that the elder Black Eagle decided his son needed a closer study of nature and launched him face-first into a serviceberry patch. Soon Sven spent most of his time searching for berries, roots and leaves for Black Eagle. He became quite knowledgeable of the medicinal effects of local flora, especially when dried and smoked in an elkhorn pipe.

Sven's adolescence was awkward in many ways. He was lanky and buck-toothed, and developed the odd habit of preceding every utterance with 'Dude!". His slate-gray eyes & brown hair invited derision from his peers. His long conversations with badgers and sparrows caused the elders to look askance. In short, he was a bit of a misfit within the tribe. Most called him "boygeorge", which, in literal translation, means "weird half-breed strange eyes full of goofy ideas".

Sven chafed at being laughed at and misunderstood. One fine spring, he decided to strike out on his own, following the river toward the white man's settlement of Great Falls. The white guys weren't much more impressed with him, especially when, shortly after arriving, he snatched Mrs. Paris Gibson's new Parisian bonnet from her head and stomped it into oblivion. His explanation that he thought it a bird of prey on the attack was ill-received, and Sven was invited to leave town.

Sven Black Eagle quickly became known along the Missouri as a strange young man. He pitched his teepee atop the hill overlooking GodNotAnotherOne Falls, and practiced flying. The flour mill workers across the river were often startled by the splashing & crashing as he belly-flopped into the Missouri, then scrambled for shore. Rumors spread around town that he shared his teepee with squirrels, gophers, and owls. Each day he spent many hours in deep meditation, awaiting visions, though usually all he got was sunstroke.

As the days cooled and the leaves began to fall, Sven became disheartened and considered returning to his tribe. Then one day, after smoking some bad peyote, he had a vision of a great smokestack rising into the clouds. And a voice spoke, saying "If you build it, they will come."