21/11/2025
Happy National Native American Heritage Month!
Today's quote comes from Wilma Mankiller. The first woman to serve as Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation, Wilma Mankiller was a trailblazer in Oklahoma and American history. Her inspirational life continues to inspire us today. Her visionary, principled leadership set a standard for generations of women to follow. She worked to create jobs, break down social and economic barriers, improve access to healthcare, and address the roots of both rural and urban poverty, leading her people with dignity and grace.
One of eleven children, Wilma Mankiller was born in 1945 in Tahlequah and raised in Mankiller Flats, Oklahoma, on land hard-earned by a resilient people who had endured a long, tumultuous history. Growing up, young Mankiller learned a love of the land and of her Cherokee identity. When she was 10, the federal government relocated her family from Mankiller Flats to a poverty-stricken area of San Francisco.
Reminiscent of the Cherokee Nation’s forced march from their North Carolina homelands to “Indian Country” in Oklahoma in 1838, the Mankiller family’s relocation to San Francisco was part of a 1950s-era U.S. government program to terminate American Indian tribes by separating Indian people from their tribal communities. Unfamiliar surroundings and the grief of a homeland left behind strengthened young Wilma’s determination to retain her Cherokee identity and contributed to her decision to join the historic 1969 American Indian occupation of Alcatraz Island. Citing a treaty that gives Native Americans the right to occupy unused land in the United States, the occupation grew to include thousands of Indian people. The movement shined an international spotlight on the “trail of broken treaties” and the forcing of Native people onto reservations that were a fraction of their original homelands. Mankiller’s time on Alcatraz ignited a flame that would guide and sustain her life’s work.
National Native American Heritage Month commemorates the history, heritage, and culture of Native Americans and Alaskan Natives. It is a time to celebrate the traditions, language and stories of these remarkable Americans who deeply enrich the quality and character of their Nations and ensure their rich histories and contributions continue to thrive with each passing generation.
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