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Emmitt Mckenzie never thought he would live to see his 16th birthday. Growing up in the streets of Oklahoma and in a broken family, Emmitt found himself increasingly angry with God and others in his youth. At age 12, he started drinking alcohol. At age 13, he joined a gang. By age 15, he was hooked on hard drugs, including methamphetamine. Emmitt found himself stuck in a reckless life of crime, drugs and gangs. "I didn't understand the gospel and what God has done for me," he...
WASHINGTON, D.C.—Native American women, like their male counterparts, share a proud tradition of military service. During the Revolutionary War, Tyonajanegan, an Oneida, fought on the side of the United States with her husband during the Battle of Oriskany, Aug. 6, 1777, in New York. She died in 1824 at the age of 84. The first active duty Native American women were four Sioux nuns, serving as Army nurses during the Spanish-American War, in 1898. One of them died in Cuba f...
I am a member of the Eastern band of Cherokee Indians; I was born and raised on the reservation in Cherokee, North Carolina when the reservation was extremely poor. I was the fourth child of a beautiful, full-blooded Cherokee woman. Unfortunately, she loved her alcohol, and she already had four children; all of us had different fathers. As a result of her drinking, after I was born, I became the responsibility, along with my other siblings, of my grandfather, who was a...
I'm from a little community in northern Saskatchewan called Turnor Lake, a hamlet and reserve where members of Birch Narrows Denesuline First Nation live. Most of my young life was spent around Buffalo Narrows with my grandparents, who had adopted me. I lost my grandfather when I was about nine years old. He was a trapper and lost his life out on the trapline, going through the ice. I got into a bit of trouble as a young person and ended up in a foster home for a while. When...
I was born and raised near Kamsack, Saskatchewan, in a place called Cote First Nation. It is home to Saulteaux people, related to Ojibway. When I was a toddler, something happened that would change everything for me. My mother, Charlotte, lived with a man who was fine when he was sober but very mean when he was drinking. When I was almost four years old, my mother died at his hands. I was old enough to see and know what had happened. My grandfather came to check on us the...
"I gotta go now or I'm going to die here," I said that early November day, when snow started falling. I grabbed the few clothes I had. I didn't have winter boots or any warm clothes to wear. I started walking down the road, and I thought of my uncle in Roblin. He was a "wino-alcoholic," but that was my only option for a place to go. I am originally from Camperville, near Pine Creek, Manitoba, on the western shore of Lake Winnipegosis. I had lived there all of my 18 years, and...
Marriages are under attack more than ever. No one can attest to that more than Sonia and Derek McLeod, who released their powerful book, Teach Me to War. This honest and stirring memoir brings the reader through the struggles and triumphs of their tumultuous Christian marriage-which included battles with lust, religion and pride. The couple was finally on the precipice of ruin, with Derek leaving the home. But at this point, God ushered in profound change, bringing both of...
I was born in Woodstock, New Brunswick, and am the youngest of four children. In my earlier years, my parents moved to St. Mary's Reserve in Fredericton. As far back as I can remember, there was a lot of alcoholism right in my home. People from my reserve, people from off the reserve, Native and non-Native people would come in to get alcohol and to drink. But my mom and dad weren't alcoholics themselves. They just drank a little socially. By the time I was 11 or 12, I was...
Penn State University graduate and associate professor in Native American History, Julie Reed, PhD, also holds a Master in Theological Studies (MTS). Through this, she not only provides lay training in theological studies, but also provides services to churches and communities. An MTS degree also prepares a person to investigate, analyze and evaluate ways different aspects of religion relate to faith-based traditions, language, and culture; it further prepares one for...
I was born in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, and my sister was born two years later. Then my parents, who were both alcoholics, broke up. My mom got into a relationship with another man and had two more daughters. Those years, we lived in a little neighborhood called Hazeldale, on the edge of the city of Prince Albert, until my little sisters were about school age. About five or six years later, my mom got into another relationship where she had two boys. That relationship...
TUCSON—At 83 years old, George Goode describes every day as a "blessing" as he makes the two-hour commute to Sells to teach local Native Americans farrier education. It was 1972 when Goode started his horseshoeing school in Tucson. Over a half-century later, he retired and founded the nonprofit Native American Horse Education Foundation in hopes of bringing a new mindset to Indigenous communities. "Out of all the years and all the reservations in the United States, there a...
It was not until 2005 that Northern Cheyenne storytellers broke their silence about what really happened at the Battle of The Little Big Horn-known mainly to Native Americans as the Battle of Greasy Grass, and to non-Natives as Custer's Last Stand. But it took more than a century before Buffalo Calf Road Woman, a Northern Cheyenne who was also known as Buffalo Calf Trail Woman-was revealed as the Native American heroine who played a pivotal role in the conflict's ending. When...
I grew up with nine brothers and four sisters in northwest Saskatchewan, near two communities-the First Nations Reserve at Dillon and the nearby Métis community of Buffalo Narrows, home to Denesuline, Cree and Caucasian people. My dad was a commercial fisherman and a trapper, and my mom and dad worked so hard for us. Being the oldest of the boys, at the age of nine, I started helping my dad, going out fishing with him. My dad was away from home quite a bit, working on big lake...
On May 6, 1946, the Church of the Indian Fellowship (CIF) was organized in Washington State's Puyallup (People of the Clear Salt Water) Reservation as a Presbyterian mission founded in 1881. It is still used today, but the building has been rebuilt over time and is still sponsored by the Presbytery. It is where Danielle Palomino-a Fifth Generation Native American-grew up and where she participated in singing hymns translated from English to the Puyallup Language by those of th...
I'm from the Mohawk tribe, my dad is from the Mohawk tribe. I came from Maine originally. I was born on February 13, 1939. In the spring of that year, my grandmother came downstate to see us; we lived in a little shack. When she drove into the yard, she saw that my mother was hitched to a cultivator. My mother had a breeching strap across her chest with the tailpiece of a harness around her neck. She was pulling this cultivator, and my dad was walking behind with a whip. When...
My testimony is really that with God all things are possible. Without God, I would never be able to do any of the things that I'm doing today. A lot of my story has to do with the struggles I faced as a young girl growing up with abandonment and addiction in my family from generation to generation. I have lost a sister to addictions, and my mother is in addiction. I've never known my father. I am the oldest, and my three siblings and I were all separated into foster care. My...
LeeAnn Dreadfulwater could be described as a woman who "wears many hats." Although little is shared via the media regarding her family and personal life, LeeAnn does not mind others knowing is that she loves riding her gleaming white Paso Fino gelding-a naturally gaited horse originally imported from Spain and prized for its natural, four-beat, smooth and ambling gait. Dreadfulwater is married, lives in Park Hill, Oklahoma, and has also lived in Tahlequah, Oklahoma....
The American Bar Association (ABA) made history in 2023 when it installed Mary L. Smith as its first ever female Native American president. Prior to Smith's election to the ABA-which is the world's largest voluntary association of lawyers, judges, and legal professionals-Smith had already served on its board of governors and was its secretary from 2017 to 2020. Born to Cherokee parents, Smith is a member of the Cherokee Nation. She is also former CEO of Indian Health Services...
Although I am a member of Ahtahkakoop Cree Nation in north-central Saskatchewan, I didn't grow up there. My mother, Noreen, was from Ahtahkakoop, and my father, Donald, from Poundmaker Cree Nation. We never lived on a reserve because my father was disenfranchised when he was a teenager-so we were non-status Indians, with my mother losing her treaty rights when she married my dad. At the time my parents met, my dad was in the Army, stationed in Chilliwack, BC, where my sister a...
John 11:35: "Jesus wept!" The shortest verse in the Bible, yet profoundly moving in lowliness of heart. He knew the circumstances surrounding the death of Lazarus, yet He wept. He wept with love in His heart, which let all humankind know that He truly cares. Growing up as a child, I was taught not to cry, not to feel, and pretty much not to share or show any emotion that ridiculed my family or me. I had learned and taught myself to suppress my tears and show no emotion when li...
Ramona Lynn Sakiestewa was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico to a Hopi father and a mother of Irish-English-German descent. She attended Verde Valley School in Sedona, Arizona, and Santa Fe Prep, Santa Fe, New Mexico. As her interest in weaving grew, Ramona taught herself to weave through reading books and from the assistance of acquaintances who were kind enough to share their expertise. In 1970, she married Arthur Sze, a poet and creative writing instructor at the Institute...
I grew up in Cumberland House, northeastern Saskatchewan. It's kind of an isolated place, about 200 km northeast from Nipawin, a larger town. The community is on an island in a delta region of the Saskatchewan River. Some of the people are still involved in fishing, hunting and trapping. My father was mainly a fisherman, so I grew up eating a lot of fish! As a kid, many times I went out with him in his boat, and then in the winter there was ice fishing, as well. I wish I...
Lucy Martin Lewis was born in a mesa in Acoma Pueblo, New Mexico, to Lola Santiago and Martin Ortiz. Her actual birthdate is unknown. But when the eldest son, Ivan, joined the Marines during World War II, the family changed their last name to Lewis. Lucy would spend her entire life in Acoma Pueblo, and as a seven-year-old, she learned to fashion pottery in much the same way as many other Native American potters: through observing and experimenting. With young Lucy, it was...
Coming from a large family, I am the youngest of eight children. My mom was from Saddle Lake First Nation in Alberta. Her first husband died fairly young from a heart attack, after which she moved to Edmonton where she met and married my dad. Edmonton is where I was born and have lived pretty well all of my life. So, I came from my mom's second marriage and Steinhauer is my family's name, which is somewhat of a prominent name around Saddle Lake. Back in history, there was a...
I grew up in southern Manitoba, mostly in adoptive care and some foster care. Where I grew up there were no other Indigenous people, except for other kids who were in adoptive or foster care. One year in elementary school our class was practicing for a Thanksgiving play. Some kids were supposed to be sailors, some pilgrims, and some Indians. When I volunteered to be an Indian, one of the kids across the room pointed at me and said, "Hey, he's already an Indian!" I still laugh...
