GREAT NATIVE WOMEN OF INDIAN COUNTRY: THE HON. WILMA MANKILLER

Words of Wisdom by the Hon. Wilma Mankiller-

"I hope many of you will be people that question why things are and why we have to do them the way we have always done them. I hope you will take some risks, exert some real leadership on issues, and if you will, dance along the edge of the roof as you continue for life."

Mankiller named fellow at university

By Associated Press

TAHLEQUAH, Okla. (AP) – Former Cherokee chief Wilma Mankiller has been named Northeastern State University’s first Sequoyah Institute Fellow.

University President Don Betz introduced Mankiller during a ceremony Sept. 4. Her office will be on the university’s main campus
in Tahlequah.

A former principal chief of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, Mankiller plans to use her post to look at intellectual, economic and cultural achievements of American Indians. She says she also wants to explore leadership for women and indigenous people.

Mankiller served as the Cherokee chief from December 1985 until retiring in 1995. At the time she assumed office, she was the first female chief of a major American Indian tribe. The Cherokees are based in Tahlequah.

(Sept.15,2009) Copyright 2009 Associated Press.





Wilma Mankiller was the sixth child of eleven children. Her parents were Charley Mankiller (born November 15, 1914) and Clara Irene Sitton (born September 18, 1921). Sitton is of Dutch and Irish descent and had no Cherokee blood but acculturated to Cherokee life.

The family surname, Mankiller, is a traditional Cherokee military rank and is Asgaya-dihi in Cherokee, which is alternatively spelled Outacity or Outacite.

The Mankiller family lived on Charley’s allotment lands of Mankiller Flats near Rocky Mountain, Oklahoma. In 1942 the US Army declared 45 Cherokee families’ allotment lands, near those of Mankiller’s family, in order to expand Camp Gruber.

The Mankillers willingly left under the Bureau of Indian Affairs' Indian Relocation Program. They moved to San Francisco, California in 1956 and later Daly City.

In 1963, at the age of 17, Mankiller married Hector Hugo Olaya de Bardi, an Ecuadorian college student. They moved to Oakland and had two daughters, Felicia Olaya, born in 1964, and Gina Olaya, born in 1966.

Mankiller returned to school, first at Skyline College, and then San Francisco State University. She had been very involved in San Francisco’s Indian Center throughout her time in California.

In the late 1960s, Mankiller joined the activist movement and participated in the Occupation of Alcatraz Island in 1969. For five years, she volunteered for the Pit River Tribe.

After divorcing Hugo Olaya, Mankiller moved back to Oklahoma with her two young daughters in 1977, in hopes of helping her own people and began an entry-level job for the Cherokee Nation

By 1983, she was elected deputy chief of the Cherokee Nation, alongside Ross Swimmer, who was serving his third consecutive term as principal chief. In 1985, Chief Swimmer resigned to take the position as head of the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

This allowed Mankiller to become the first female principal chief. She was freely elected in 1987, and re-elected again in 1991 in a landslide victory, collecting 83% of the vote. In 1995, Wilma chose not to run again for Chief largely due to health problems.

Mankiller faced many obstacles during her tenure in office. At the time she became chief, the Cherokee Nation was male-dominated.

Such a structure contrasted with the traditional Cherokee culture and value system, which instead emphasized a balance between the two genders.

Over the course of her three terms, Mankiller would make great strides to bring back that balance and reinvigorate the Cherokee Nation through community-development projects where men and women work collectively for the common good,based on the Bureau of Indian Affairs "Self Help" programs first initiated by the United Keetoowah Band, and with the help of the Federal Governments Self-Determination monies.

These project include establishing tribally owned businesses, such as horticultural operations and plants with government defense contracts, and improving infrastructure, such as providing running water to the community of Bell, Oklahoma and building a hydroelectric facility.

Under the US Federal policy of Native American self-determination, Mankiller was able to improve federal-tribal negotiations, paving the way for today's Government-to-Government relationship the Cherokee Nation has with the US Federal Government.

Examples of progress included the founding of the Cherokee Nation Community Development Department, the revival of Sequoyah High School in Tahlequah, and a population increase of Cherokee Nation citizens from 55,000 to 156,000.

"Prior to my election," says Mankiller, "young Cherokee girls would never have thought that they might grow up and become chief.

After many years working together on Cherokee community development projects, Mankiller married her longtime friend, Charlie Lee Soap, a full-blood Cherokee traditionalist and fluent Cherokee speaker, in 1986. They live on Mankiller's ancestral land at Mankiller Flats.


She won several awards including Ms. Magazine's Woman of the Year in 1987, Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Oklahoma Women's Hall of Fame, Woman of the Year, the Elizabeth Blackwell Award, John W. Gardner Leadership Award, Independent Sector, and was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 1993.

Her first book, Mankiller: A Chief and Her People, an autobiography, became a national bestseller.

Gloria Steinem said in a review that, "As one woman's journey, Mankiller opens the heart. As the history of a people, it informs the mind. Together, it teaches us that, as long as people like Wilma Mankiller carry the flame within them, centuries of ignorance and genocide can't extinguish the human spirit." In 2004, Mankiller co-authored Every Day Is a Good Day: Reflections by Contemporary Indigenous Women.

Source-Wikipedia

BOYCOTT RACIST SAM'S CLUB, SAVE OUR ANCESTORS AND SACRED SITES

NATIVE PEOPLE BOYCOTT THE RACIST SAM'S CLUB, SAVE OUR ANCESTOR'S AND SACRED SITES

GOOD BYE INDIAN BURIAL MOUNDS, HELLO SAM'S CLUB

A backhoe removes dirt atop a stone mound created by Native Americans 1,500 years ago in what is now Oxford, Ala. (AP Photo/Stephen Gross, The Anniston Star)

Goodbye Indian Mounds, Hello Sam’s Club

July 10, 2009

By Dan Whisenhunt for The Anniston Star via the Associated Press

OXFORD, Ala. (AP)—A stone mound on a hill behind the Oxford Exchange created by American Indians 1,500 years ago will soon disappear.

And whether Oxford's taxpayers wanted it or not, they paid for its destruction.
Workers hired by the city's Commercial Development Authority (CDA) are using the dirt from the hill as fill for a new Sam's Club. The project has angered American Indians who, along with a Jacksonville State University archaeology professor, say the site could contain human remains.

Oxford Mayor Leon Smith and City Project Manager Fred Denney say it was used to send smoke signals.

The city's CDA uses taxpayer money and assets to lure commercial businesses. The $2.6 million no-bid CDA contract for preparing the Sam's site went to Oxford-based Taylor Corp. That money came from the sale of city property to Georgia-based developers Abernathy and Timberlake and from additional money provided by the city.

In Alabama, CDAs are exempt from bid laws, meaning contracts can go to whichever company the board chooses. Oxford's CDA board and its actions have multiple connections to Smith's political fundraising:

• At least three board members or their employers have contributed to his political campaigns.

• Taylor Corp., under the ownership of Tommy Taylor, has received thousands of dollars in city contracts for non-CDA work. Taylor donated $1,000 to Smith in 2004 and $1,000 in 2008.

• Abernathy and Timberlake donated $1,000 to Smith's re-election campaign in 2004.

• Montgomery-based Goodwyn, Mills and Cawood donated $500 to Smith in 2004. The CDA gave the company engineering contracts for the exchange. Denney said the CDA paid the company $45,000 for engineering work, part of which paid for a University of Alabama study on the American Indian site.

Eligible for National Register of Historic Places?

The Anniston Star newspaper has so far been unable to obtain a copy of the University of Alabama study, but a letter from the Alabama Historical Commission's deputy state historic preservation officer indicated the university did not think the site was eligible for the National Register of Historic Places. The state Historic Preservation Commission did think the site was eligible for the National Register.

City Project Manager Denney said the report's authors found little at the site. Mayor Smith has said there is nothing wrong with the connections between himself and the CDA. He has described Taylor as a, "good friend."

Attempts to reach representatives for Taylor Corp. and Abernathy and Timberlake on Monday were unsuccessful. The Birmingham office of Goodwyn, Mills and Cawood declined comment.

CDA members contacted by The Star declined comment, referring questions to board chairman Dwight Rice. Attempts to reach Rice on Monday also were unsuccessful.

Chervis Isom, a Birmingham attorney representing Abernathy and Timberlake, said the company isn't involved with the hill or the fill dirt.

"If the dirt were contaminated in some way we'd certainly have an interest in that," Isom said. "Where the CDA got the dirt I'm not sure. We don't have any control over that." He added he does not think there is any problem with the dirt.

Denney said workers will remove about one-third of the hill and cover it with grass. The city eventually will develop commercial business on what remains of the hill, he said.

A September 2008 proposal by Taylor Corp. describes the demolition in vague terms. "This item includes undercutting two building pad footprints ..." the report reads. "The City has agreed to let us spoil the undercut material on their property across the new bridge."

Denney said the line in the proposal refers to the hill. "The agreement was we'd furnish the soil," Denney said. "The city would furnish them a place to get it."

The City Council transferred the property containing the hill to the CDA in February. Councilwoman June Land Reaves, who voted against the transfer, said she did not understand the hill property was a part of it.

"I never heard any discussion about dirt being taken from the hillside or a reason why that was being done, but it seems to me like a lot of cities capitalize on the history they have ... but (we do not seem) to do that," she said.

Too Late for City Council Intervention

Council President Chris Spurlin said it's too late for the City Council to intervene at the site. He said he hated the bad publicity, but said there is no proof the site holds human remains.

"The CDA has the authority," Spurlin said. "They're trying to do what's best for the city. I don't see no reason in buying fill dirt from someone when we have that hill available."

In a follow-up story, The Anniston Star later reported:

OXFORD, Ala. (AP)—City officials have ignored another protest over the city's decision to destroy a stone mound on a hill behind the Oxford Exchange created by American Indians 1,500 years ago.

Tony Castaneda, of Anniston, and Sharon Jackson, of Fruithurst, who say they are Indian elders, presented Mayor Leon Smith with a petition Monday containing more than 600 signatures of people opposed to the site's destruction. The Anniston Star reported Tuesday Smith became agitated when the two arrived at City Hall, took the petition and went back inside.

Castaneda and Jackson collected more signatures at City Hall that evening. The state Historical Commission says the mound is the largest of its kind in Alabama. The city paid to have part of the hill taken down for fill at a Sam's Club.

Dan Whisenhunt is a reporter at The Anniston (Ala.) Star. This story was distributed by the Associated Press. (reznetnews.org)

CHEROKEE SPIRITUALITY AND THE CALL FOR CREATOR'S WORLD RENEWAL MEDICINE

CHEROKEE SPIRITUALITY AND THE CALL FOR CREATOR'S WORLD RENEWAL MEDICINE MEDICINE

By Mike (Ali) Raccoon Eyes Kinney



As a Traditional, but urban born and raised Cherokee, I hear the spiritual call that it will soon be time for the Creator's World Renewal Medicine cycles to begin.

It is time for the People's Nation to starting walking down the Good Red Road and reconnecting with OUR own indigenous belief and value system. It now the time to reconnect ourselves to Creator and our unique World Renewal Medicine.

Now is the time to stand up like true Native men and women, as the Cherokee/Real People no longer have the luxury to be disconnected from our culture, language, history and most importantly, our spiritual and belief value system.

As a Cherokee Advocate for more Human and Civil Rights for Indian Country, I have only one driving principle: "We stand before the banner of our People, so our People may live!"

Many Cherokee today have no idea or concept of who we are as a People. It is frustrating that so many Cherokee individuals and families are so disconnected from our own living history.


In Creator's eyes, just the fact you are a Cherokee person, you are an extension of that history, even today. We have always been and always shall be what we are --Creator's Holy People.

It is important for all Cherokee to have pride in being a Cherokee. Cherokee Native Pride is not just a slogan; it is a timeless way of life.
To discover your Cherokee self is a slow, daily process of reconnecting to the Creator and our unique spiritual belief and value system.

As a Cherokee living in the so-called conquered Native land we call Turtle Island, you must live in a way that is a tribute and celebration to the Ancestors and families before you and their quest to survive, regardless of the bloodshed and genocide of the past.

We Cherokee have an expression, "With no tears in our eyes, we look boldly
ahead to the future as a People!"

In our long road from our Meso-American days, through 'Our Trail of Tears', to our forced flight to the concrete, urban cities of Turtle Island, we as a People have had a remarkable ability to reinvent ourselves in order to survive.

Now the real question remains, as Creator's Holy People, where are we headed?

Remember that since Sacred Time, Creation Time, First Man and First Woman Time, Creator made all generations of Cherokee from the past to the present and into the future as a Holy People.

CHEROKEE PEOPLE HAVE ALWAYS KNOWN THEY WERE CREATOR'S HOLY PEOPLE FROM THE BEGINNING OF TIME

Our ancestors were from the stars, so in effect we are the descendants of star children. Look at our proud Cherokee nation flag. Seven stars and one star is a seven-pointed star. In the oral traditions of our People, the Ancestors shared that we come from the star system known as the Pleiades.

In our culture, we lovingly call the seven stars 'The Boys'. Our Ancestors have stated that the Original Cherokee people came in 'flying machines' from Pleiades.

The Ancient Ones tell in our stories that the Cherokee came in massive waves of migrations to populate northern South America, the Caribbean, Central America, Mexico and the greater Southeast of the United States before pre-contact time.

We as a People in the old days of Meso-America built the great pyramid temple cities, our culture and influence connected North, Central and South America together.

As Native people, we have a strong and vibrant history of being peacekeepers, diplomats, negotiators and mediators. Our approach to Cherokee politics has held our Cherokee Nation together.

Our common sense approach and Traditional political methods have both inspired and motivated other Native nations, the Europeans and the Americans to follow suit.

The Cherokee have demonstrated our amazing influence and impact on the Americas based on our own unique spiritual and belief system.

It is imperative for Cherokee families and individuals to learn to tear away the images and stereotypes that mainstream society has placed upon us. We must also strengthen our beliefs within our families and ourselves and stand strong as a Nation. There are many who "claim to be Cherokee" and these individuals dishonor us with their acts to be "pretindians."

We can no longer attack, punish, or beat up ourselves for crimes we have never committed.

We must start to view ourselves with good self-esteem, self-worth, and self-value.

As Creator's original Holy People, this was the Creator's plan.

Rolling Thunder, Cherokee doctor and activist once stated about the presence of the Cherokee upon the Americas:

"WE WERE HERE WHEN THIS EARTH WAS YOUNG. IT SHOOK WHEN WE WALKED ON IT. THAT'S HOW ANCIENT WE ARE ON THIS LAND."