Intertribal Life Newspaper -

Mele had always been some mythical character in the far distant past. I’d heard bits and pieces of her story from family members.

Her mother’s name was High Feather, or maybe Little Feather; no one knew for sure. She was part of the Ponca Tribe and may have been raised by the Sioux. Her father, a French trapper with a roguish reputation, had traded her off to a man in payment of a gambling debt. Her daughter, one of eleven children, had married my great grandfather.

I did not grow up near the Ponca people. I had heard Mom tell stories about Nebraska, but I was too immature t...