A $15 million Bill and Melissa Gates Foundation grant has brought the Navajo Nation into the 21st century.

The grant supplied satellite dishes and wireless Internet networks to all 110 chapters of the Navajo Nation. People of all ages are using the system, said Renda Fowler, the community services director for the Tonalea chapter in Arizona

"We're a long ways from the nearest good public library and this gives us access to information," Fowler told The Arizona Republic. "The older people also are picking it up more and more because they've seen how you can use pages like eBay to buy and sell things."

More than 90 percent of tribal members now have e-mail, said the executive a company that installed the wireless network.

Get the Story:
Tribe's tech plan a model program (The Arizona Republic 9/19)

Related Stories:
Tulalip Tribes build high-speed network on reservation (9/18)
Firm fined $4.6M for defrauding Pine Ridge schools (04/21)
Company brings phone service to Navajo Nation (03/24)
GAO: Telephone service lacking in Indian Country (02/17)
FCC fines company over tribal phone programs (11/23)
Navajo Nation households can sign up for $1 cell phones (07/08)
Coeur d'Alene Tribe launches wireless service (06/08)
Sovereignty, diversity stressed at FCC media hearing (05/27)
FCC hears from South Dakota tribes on telecom (05/27)
Arizona tribes say phone programs not promoted (05/24)
USET signs 'best practices' agreement with FCC (02/04)
Navajo landowners question BIA agreement with company (10/21)
Navajo Nation homes to get telephone service (08/19)
Digital divide still an issue for Indian Country (05/23)
FCC report shows rise in telephone service (05/13)
FCC denies S.D. tribe's telephone bid (8/30)
New FCC chair raises digital divide doubts (2/7)
Budget bill limits reach of low-power radio (12/19)
Technology tour winds up (10/23)
Colleges receive recycled equipment (10/19)
Indian Country part of technology tour (10/18)
Indians left out of digital divide (10/17)
Verizon to offer cheap phones (10/03)
FCC embraces sovereignty (06/09)
Breaking the Digital Divide (6/8)
Indian Country: Falling into the Digital Divide? (04/17)
Indian Country: Falling into the Digital Divide? (04/11)
Digital Divide Stats (4/11)