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by Dawn Scher Thomae

EDITOR'S NOTE: This article was reprinted from LORE magazine (vol. 43, no. 3 (September, 1993), p. 9-18), a benefit of museum membership. ©1996 Milwaukee Public Museum, Inc.

Very few people really know what goes on behind the scenes during the development of a major exhibit. I began working on "A Tribute to Survival" in 1990 and little did I know to what extent I would be asked to perform such duties as stalking junkyards with a screwdriver and hammer looking for car logos, such as "Thunderbird" and "Cheyenne", in the pouring rain, or calling around asking if shops carried white or brown wooden eggs.

Among my many responsibilities during the progression of the exhibit was photographic research. One aspect of the exhibit was to focus on Native American veterans. I found almost nothing on this subject. This was disturbing to me. After all, I even knew about the Navajo Code Talkers in WWII and that Ira Hayes, a Pima Indian, was one of the men to raise the flag on Iwo Jima. I was expecting to find books, articles, and photographs galore. I found so little that I became obsessed (This is a side effect of the profession). I wrote to veterans organizations, history museums, military museums and most times I received nothing. I searched Indian newspapers and followed personal leads. After a year, I managed to accumulate a small, but significant, stack of material.

On a weekly basis I would open the file drawer and ask myself, "Now what am I going to do with this?". The material continuously haunted me. I was reluctant to begin writing; I kept procrastinating and I didn't know why. One day I was looking at a photograph of Mitchell Red Cloud, Jr., a Winnebago Indian from Wisconsin who was the only Native American to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor during the Korean War. And then it finally dawned on me. The files, pamphlets, books and photos were only part of the picture. Somehow the human element was missing (maybe I've been working with objects too long because as an anthropologist, this should have occurred to me earlier). If I really wanted to know about this I had to go the Native American veterans themselves.

Veterans are greatly respected in Native American societies and this honor is nowhere more apparent than at powwows. In a Grand Entry, the veterans are asked to carry a flag and are the first to enter the powwow circle. In "A Tribute to Survival" , our four veterans (These individuals served as models for "Tribute" figures, but this element of the exhibit is not meant to portray them as specific people but as representations of powwow participants.) are carrying a U.S. Army flag, an American flag, a Canadian flag and an Eagle feather staff. I approached these veterans and asked if I might interview them; to find out more about why they went into the military and what they experienced.

The first veteran I interviewed was JoAnn Lenz, a Stockbridge-Munsee Indian and army nurse who carries the Army flag in our exhibit.

D: During what war were you in the military?
J: Desert Storm. I'm not really considered a veteran because I'm still active. As soon as I retire, then I'm considered a veteran. I'm an active duty person at this point. Active in the Army reserves.

D: When did you leave for Desert Storm?
J: I didn't really go there. During a time of war, everybody is basically on call. So although our whole unit didn't go, parts of our unit went. All the LPN's, some of the doctors, the lab people. Because the war was so short, the rest of our unit didn't go. This was the first time reservists were ever called up. We were told that our whole unit was to be mobilized together but that didn't happen.

D: Has anyone from your family been in the military?
J: My brother was active duty navy and several cousins and some uncles were in the service. During WWII both of my parents were civilian welders. My father volunteered but they wouldn't send him because he had experience working on ships so both my mother and father built ships in Sturgeon Bay. My ancestors also volunteered for George Washington. Konkapot fought for the patriots.

D: You said you've been in the reserves for 9 years. Why didn't you make it a full-time career?
J: At the time I joined I had a scholarship from the Milwaukee County Medical Complex. That was a 3 year commitment and and they paid for me to go Marquette University.

D: How has the military changed your life?
J: It gave me a great opportunity for education that was paid for by the military. I've met a lot of people in other facilities around the United States and I got to see how people lived in those areas. It gave me an opportunity to grow and exposed me to things I wanted to learn.

D: What was your reason for going into the military?
J: Well, first of all, my brother-in-law is an army recruiter and the army has the most medical facilities. I went in as a medical/surgical nurse because that was what I was doing at the time. Now I'm doing a lot more administrative things because I've been in longer and am a captain now.

D: Do you feel any different in the military because you are a Native American?
J: I'm sure everyone has different feelings about it. I think I have a different perspective in coming at it. I think coming from a reservation and knowing some of the history regarding the military and Indians and knowing the lack of health care for Indians sensitized me. I know a lot of people asked "why would you even want to be in the military, all they do is kill people". Well, as a nurse, I am trying to help people, it doesn't matter who they are. To me anybody deserves health care if something happens and why not be trained to help?

D: Do you think people treated you differently if they knew you were a Native American?
J: I previously thought that Indian people were very discriminated against in many different things. It depends on where you are. If I'm in an area where there are a large number of Indians in the community then that area is usually very prejudiced. But in a large metropolitan area it is less because you blend in with so many people. Nowadays there is more openness and interest in Indians. More people are identifying to be Indian now; it gives them an identity. People used to hide it for many years but now they don't feel so bad about it.

D: Do you feel that being an American Indian was advantageous or disadvantageous in the service?
J: I don't think it made too much of a difference. Only because I grew up in an area where I didn't go to an Indian school; I went to a regular school.

D: Would you encourage other American Indians to go into the military?
J: Yes. Some of my friends have been in for years in active duty or in the reserves and I think its good to give them the experiences to be involved and see and work in different parts of the world. It helps because many people only know the reservation. There is that one focus and that is all you see. Yes, it is a good experience.

Huston Wheelock (Oneida) carries the American flag in our exhibit.

D: During what war were you in the military?
H: I was in the Korean war.

D: Did you volunteer or were you drafted?
H: I volunteered because I was drafted. They were doing a number lottery and I asked them when I would be called in. I didn't want to wait around. I wanted to get it over with and serve my time. One of my cousins and I were in the same category so we decided one day to go to Green Bay and enlist. He asked "What are we going to enlist in?
" I said " I don't know." He said "I'll tell you what, we will walk into the recruiting office and whatever we come into first, we'll enlist in." So walked into the Marine Corp and we enlisted. Then I was sorry. They shipped us out the same day.

D: Has anyone in your family ever been in the military?
H: Yes. My father, my uncle, my cousin. In WWI my uncle earned one of the highest awards,the Croix de Guerre. The Congressional Medal of Honor would be almost equal to that.

D: How many years were you in the military?
H: I put my three years in. I went in and out.

D: Why didn't you make the military a career?
H: I wanted to be free, go and come as you please. Not sign out and sign in. Somebody telling you everything- what to do and what not to do.

D: Where were you stationed?
H: I went to San Diego for boot camp. There were these three guys smoking and there was a sign that said no smoking. They threw them right up against the wall and beat the hell out of them right there. I said to myself "What did I let myself in for?
" Those three guys went AWOL that same night. Then they showed us how to make a bed, how they wanted it made. Then they would rip them up and say fix'em again. We did that for about 4 hours. It was about 3 in the morning when they said we could go to bed. We slept and at 5 o'clock got us up for breakfast. I'll never forget boot camp. I seen people go down tied to a jeep. It was supposed to be a simulation of dead or broken back. They bring them up on a stretcher tied to a jeep and the rope breaks and they go down with them. Boys got smashed between landing barges. I seen lots of things like that.

D: Where did you go from San Diego?
H: They transferred me to Camp Pendleton. I was in unit 105. I sat there for 2 or 3 months. They were taking men out of infantry everyday and shipping them overseas. Then I transferred to infantry. There they were sending 50 men overseas. You put your name on a piece of paper, throw it into a hat and shake it up. My name was never drawn. I finally got to Japan and asked the people in artillery who went ahead of me about this guy or that guy that was in unit 105 and they said that I transferred at the right time because all but two were killed in an artillery dual. I think someone was looking out for me. Another time, I was supposed to be on board a ship headed for Korea and I got called back. The ship was run over by one of our own destroyers at night in the fog. Killed every man on board. So I missed that again.

D: How long were you in Korea?
H: A day. I was sent back to Japan so I never did see action.

D: You were a private in the military when you got out?
H: Yes. PFC. I was in artillery. Some of the old gunner sergeants liked to have an Indian with them. For luck. One thing I remember is that different times they took us out to the mountains to find our way back and if you made good time, you got a 71 hour pass. So they left us all together. 12 Indians were in the company and we were back in camp 3 hours later. They thought we were lost because they couldn't find us in the field. We were already on liberty.

D: Did you feel any different in the military because you were an American Indian?
H: No. Maybe because I'm talkative. There would be people who would walk by sometimes and say something then I'd begin talking to him and the next thing you know we'd end up shooting the bull. Nothing serious.

D: So you don't think there was any advantage or disadvantage?
H: No, but I was kind of a daredevil Indian. I was in demolitions and I was in trouble a lot. I blew up a Coke machine.

D: What do you mean you...?
H: You see it looks like clay. You put it along the seams and get a little stem like that. A fuse. As soon as it hits that, it blows.

D: You blew a door off a Coke machine?
H: And I took off right away so I wouldn't be in the area.

D: Did they ever find out?
H: They figured it out. Another time they had a bunker out there and I had 800 lbs of TNT left over so I asked what I was supposed to do with it and they said do what you want. So I blew that bunker up. I had CIA out there and the General and the fire department. That big cloud of smoke and that big boom. They said, "What did you do that for?
" "You told me to do what I wanted, so I blew that bunker up."

D: Did you have a bad reputation for this?
H: It was mostly fun. But I said I would never be a drop out. We'd go on 6-7 mile hikes and finally one night a Corpsman told me I had bad feet, blistered really bad. We went on a hike the next day, come in that night and the whole bottom of my feet were blistered and bloody. The next day I went out there and the Sargent said everyone with bad feet, fall out. I didn't fall out.

D: Why?
H: It was my pride. I wasn't going to fall out in a war.

D: You mentioned that there were about 12 other Indians in your unit. Were they all from Wisconsin?
H: No, from New York, some Pueblo, Apache.

D: How did you feel to come back home after 3 years in the military?
H: Like most servicemen, I was very restless. They get you up early and they keep you going, you never get a dead moment. I stayed in Milwaukee for awhile and then I went up north; farm work and stuff. I more or less goofed around. I was just about 22 years old. I thought the only one who is going to starve is me. I got a steady job after I got engaged and stayed with that until the time my wife died. The job folded, too. Since then I worked at the airport, then the Indian Health Board as a security guard and now at Potawatomi Bingo as a security guard.

D: How long have a been carrying a flag in Grand Entry?
Do you usually do that at powwows?
H: No, I get called on.

D: Do you do the powwow circuit?
H: No, I just go to some that I feel like going to. Lately, I haven't gone to any because of my leg.

D: At least you're walking around. H: That's one of my hobbies. I like to walk in the woods. I seem most contented there. Closer to nature and my maker there.

Joe Connors (Chippewa) carries the Canadian flag in our exhibit.

D: What war were you in the military?
J: For most of it, the Korean war. 1946-1951

D: Did you volunteer?
J: Yeah, I volunteered. I went into the service because there was no work around when I got out of high school.

D: Did you enlist with anyone?
J: My friend went along. His name was Peter Whitefeather. He stayed in and retired 24 years later. He was a radio man.

D: How old were you when you went into the military?
J: I was seventeen.

D: What branch were you in?
J: Air Force

D: Why did you pick the Air Force?
J: I don't know. I just went up to the recruiter and he told me that me and my friend could go in together and be together.

D: Did you know of anyone in your family who had been in the military?
J: My older brother was in the Navy and the Marine Corps during WWII and the Korean War.

D: Do you remember anything from boot camp?
J: No, not too much. Just this one guy; they gave him a GI shower, but I don't know why because he was okay.

D: What is a GI shower?
J: They all go in the shower and use scrubbing brushes and that old army soap, like lye.

D: What was your position in the Air Force?
J: I was a clerk/typist.

D: How is your typing now?
J: I can't type now. (Shows hand with missing finger)

D: How did you do that?
J: I lost it at work when I was working for Lutten Manufacturing Company in 1971. I was setting up a machine and I tripped.

D: You can always say that its an old war wound. J: A lot of times I'll limp around work and they'll ask "What's wrong?
" And I say"Oh, its my wooden leg" (He smiles)

D: How did you become a clerk/typist?
J: We took some tests when I was out of basic training in San Antonio. They picked you and put you where they wanted. I never wanted to be a clerk/typist. It isn't easy.

D: Where were you stationed?
J: Last place I was stationed was Scottsfield, Illinois... and Denver, Colorado. Most of my time was spent overseas in Guam. We went over on a troop ship. Some of us got dropped off in Guam and the other ones got dropped off in the Philippines or Japan.

D: How long were you in Guam?
J: Three years.

D: Why didn't you stay in?
J: I don't know. I just didn't. I thought about it but after I got back to the states, I said, nah. Then I came down here to Milwaukee to work.

D: Were you living in Milwaukee before you went into the service?
J: We were living in Ashland on the Bad River Reservation in Odanah.

D: How did it feel to come back home?
J: It felt okay for awhile. I only stayed around my hometown there for about two months. then I came to Milwaukee.

D: Did you leave because there wasn't a lot of work up there?
J: After I came back, I was used to being around St. Louis and all those cities down there. More activities than there is up there.

D: Were there any special events or activities that your family observed before you left or when you came back?
J: No, there weren't any traditions. I picked that up later. When I was in the Boy Scouts I danced a little bit. Years later, I thought I'd get back into it.

D: Did you feel any different in the military because you were an American Indian?
J: No, when I first got in they asked me what I was and I told them I was an American Indian. Most of my friends in the service were all from out East and they asked if I lived in tipis and stuff. I said"No, we live in regular houses". They used to call me Cherokee because they couldn't remember that I was Chippewa.

D: Were there any American Indians in your unit besides yourself?
J: Yes. In boot camp there was a guy from my hometown right in the next barracks but I didn't know it until we were ready to be reassigned. I saw two other friends later on. When I was overseas there was a guy who I used to talk to. I think he was part Cherokee. You couldn't tell; he was blonde and blue-eyed. He showed me pictures of his family and he was the only light one in there. The rest were all dark.

D: Do you think people treated you any different in the military because you were an American Indian?
J: Some did, some didn't. All depends on who you're with. I never had no discrimination, not like this black guy in boot camp. They put him into a barracks all by himself. He finally transferred into an almost all black unit. They were really discriminatory.

D: Did the military change your life?
J: In certain ways it does change you. I probably should have stayed there...In the military you get more discipline and stuff. Gives you options in life.

George Amour (Chippewa) carries the Eagle feather staff in our Grand Entry scene.

D: During what war were you in the military?
G: Vietnam. I was in the Marine Corps. We went to Laos in the end of September 1960 before anybody knew it was a word or a country. It was a CIA sponsored effort. On paper we were military advisors and as such we were supposed to be unarmed and give field training to Laotian soldiers. Train them how to kill people...Real nice, huh?
When in fact we're armed and basically engaged in combat. I was a forward observer in a group, an outfit called Naval Gunfire. We, as forward observers, would call in firing missions.

D: What exactly does a forward observer do?
G: Forward observers are the guys who get way out in front of everybody and they are on a hill or on high ground. He looks around and spots the enemy and he plots where they are on the map and gets on the radio and calls somebody who has the big guns. And the guys with the big guns take the information and fire a shot over land to the target and the forward observer directs the fire until it hits the target.

D: Did you volunteer for that position or were you chosen for that position?
G: No... the last thing I volunteered for was to join the Marines and that was it. Once you are in its not a democracy.

D: So you weren't drafted?
G: No, I joined the service because I knew that at some point I would be drafted, so I might as well join the branch of my choice and get it over with when I wanted to rather than have a career or a job or whatever, a marriage, interrupted by military service, so I joined the Marine Corps for 4 years. They determine by their needs what I was to do based in part on my skills and intelligence. So they trained me to be a radio telegraph operator and a forward observer.

D: Why did you pick the Marines?
G: Because I was nuts...and I still am (he laughs). Actually, my brother, who would have been a career Army soldier, was in WWII. He was a ranger, that is kind of like a commando-type guy that went ahead of everybody. He got out alive and he had experience with Turkish soldiers. He told me that they were the best fighting group in the whole world. Because I asked him for his advice on what branch I should join, he told me about the Turkish Army. It was obvious I wasn't going to join the turkish Army so then he told me that in Korea he was impressed by how the Marine Corps saved his outfit, his Army outfit. So based on that, my brother's advice...who I considered a war hero. He had three Purple hearts and a couple of Silver Stars. Another reason I joined the Marine Corps was because my girlfriend's stepfather at the time didn't think I could make it because I was a laid-back, moderate kind-of- guy. I was timid, bashful and quiet. So based on my brother's advise and my girlfriend's stepfather, I took that as a challenge. That was a dumb thing to do, so I joined the Marine Corps and got myself blown up.

D: You got blown up? You look like you're all in one piece.
G: Scars and needle marks from sewing me up don't show anymore. I was only over there for a short time in Laos and we were on the vantage point to see a place that was the whole Ho Chi Minh Trail where all those bad guys would deliver stuff-troops and material across Laos and Vietnam. So we were there to shoot at them and blow 'em up. Supposedly training Laotian soldiers to do that. But they would hide at the back of the fox holes while I shot at people. So anyway, I was there for only a couple of days. The way I like to think about it is, if I wouldn't have gotten blown up at the time I did, I probably would've been killed because of who I was and the kind of job I had in the forward area.

D: When you got hurt, did they ship you out?
G: Yeah, like I said, it was a CIA thing and we weren't supposed to be fighting; we were supposed to be advising and training. Incoming mortar hit and I was operating a radio in a radio jeep and the driver turned to get down off a hill, a mountain, and a mortar round hit. Turned the jeep over and he got killed and I got thrown out and busted my head. I woke up three days later in a Navy hospital in California. That's what it took... that got me out of there. My military record doesn't show a lot of that.

D: Was that toward the end? You said you were in for 4 years.
G: Yes. That happened on October 2 or 3 of 1960. Then I had one more year to go for my enlistment. Like I said, I woke up three days later at Camp Pendleton. The doctor said that if I wouldn't have come out of my coma then, I would've been a vegetable.

D: Were you thinking about making the Marines a career?
G: No. I joined just to get it by me and, in part, go with that warrior tradition. Mostly, i just wanted to prove to my girlfriend's stepfather that I could do it and I did it. After I got out of the hospital, I came home on leave and I had my uniform, ribbons and all of that. I more or less, in proving myself, said "See".

D: What did he say to that?
G: Before I came home, this girl and I had split up. She sent me a "Dear George" letter while I was in the service. Anyway, when I came home on leave I did want to show them what I had done with my ribbons and my rank and all of that. So that was that. After I got out of the Navy hospital, I was real slick. My head was all busted up and one Corpsman who had seen the x-rays told me that my head looked like a road map...with all the cracks and breaks and stuff. There's a flat spot here the size of a silver dollar. I was bald-headed on the back of my head for the last year of my enlistment. I pretended that my head was real tender. I didn't bother to wear a helmet or a hat and nobody bothered me. I was the only Marine walking around Camp Pendleton that year without a head cover. I played it for what it was worth.

D: How old were you when you went in?
G: I think I was 17 or 18. Probably 18.

D: How do you think that being in the military changed your life?
G: It matured me. I think I matured a lot faster than other people who were friends who didn't join the military, who didn't have a chance to have combat experience. You go overseas to different places, you see all kinds of different people and experience different sensations, different customs. It was funny, the places I went, everybody knew I was an American Indian.

D: How did they know?
G: Just because of what I looked like. I supposed they associated Indians with the Marine Corps. I don't know.

D: There were quite a few that joined the Marines; not too many joined the Navy. G: I used to think about the Navy...I didn't want to join an outfit where you walked around looking like you're wearing pajamas all the time, for one thing. And the white uniform... I couldn't keep anything clean when I was young!

D: How did it feel to come home? Were you happy to be out?
G: After I was discharged? Well, yeah, I lived in California...San Diego. The era I was living in was the beatnik era and the beach songs and all of that. I got to know a lot of those kinds of people when I went on weekend liberty out in San Diego. I go to know a whole bunch of people, professional people and some very non-professionals. Professional bums. When I was discharged, I stayed out there and hung around with all those folks. I joined a group who were from the islands. Not joined them, but we kind of gravitated toward each other because we were all brown-skinned. In one beach bar, we would entertain people. They taught me how to do some of those Tahitian island dances, Polynesian dances. I wasn't built like an islander, I had kind of a slim build...I didn't have all that "insulation". They had one dance...I call it the "Slap Dance" where you slapped your thighs and touched your arms and all that. You did it with vigor and I was really "one red skin". Blotchy. It was fun. I lived out there for a good year and followed the beatnik trail. What I liked was they were tribal people and that was what I was looking for so I stayed there. I came back home because my mother wanted to see what I looked like.

D: She wanted you to come home?
G: Yeah, well, through my sister, she indicated that...my sister would be the one who called me. She told me "Mom wants to see you,she is wondering how you are doing". What she meant was "She knows you had been banged up and doesn't know what you look like. She wants to see that you are all there." That kind of thing. She thinks of me in reference to my brother who was in the Army and was 100% disabled in Korea. Another reason I came home was that I stayed with a guy out there and we shared in buying a boat,a "Tahiti Ketch", a 32 foot ocean sailer. We thought we could sail that boat to Tahiti...and make money hauling cargo and stuff like that. We joined a yacht club, we took the ship, or catch, up on dry dock and began to work on it. It took up a year. In that year, my partner fell in love and got married to the yacht club's Commandant's daughter. So I knew that we weren't going to be sailing to Tahiti or doing anything, bachelor type or adventure thing. I symbolically gave her my half of the boat and caught a bus back to Milwaukee. I came out here and saw my Mom and said "See Mom, here I am, I've got 5 toes and all my fingers!".

D: When you joined did you join with anyone you knew?
G: No, when I joined, I joined because everyone was mad at me. My mother and everybody. I had a nice car and I got into an accident with it...the car was really bad. We rolled over twice and landed in the ditch...We got back to Milwaukee and everybody knew what George Amour had done to his car and how it happened. So I had everybody mad at me...so I decided to run away.

D: Did you leave for the military right away...after you signed up?
G: About a week later. We went and had a physical...that was embarrassing. Fifty or more total strangers. You had to stand there stark naked. Then the doctor comes on one side then the other guys turn around and moons the others. Right after the physical we caught the North Shore Transit...the train going to Chicago. Got us on the airplane. They started rounding us up like dirt or sheep. I started having a second opinion about what I did.

D: Before you left, were there any special activities observed or after you came back?
G: Celebrations to honor or welcome me or anything? No, I just came home. Well, my family, we all hugged and all that kind of stuff but we aren't really a hugging family, the men. We are sort of reserved that way. I hugged my mother and a couple of tears came to her eyes and my eyes. You know, that kind of thing. We had a meal and that was about it.

D: Did you feel you were treated any differently in the military because you were an American Indian?
G: I was always aware that I'm an Indian because I don't think like other people. I see things differently and I've got to go think about how I'm witnessing or participating in something. I have to think about it or try to figure out how the other people are looking at it before I do anything stupid or, you know, you have to go with the flow. You don't want to stand out in the military. The leaders, NCO and officers in the Marine Corps, were glad that I was an Indian...and they more or less would tell me...many different ways of telling me that I had a tradition to uphold. The courageous warrior thing. So I was put into a mold of a warrior and (they) expected me to fulfill that. It was a heck of a time. I became one heck of a Marine. I did that because I wanted to...get out of my outfit and go on temporary additional duty and get all the training I could get. As long as I was there, I wanted to be as gung-ho as I could. I couldn't see the sense of being a private and working in a mess hall all the time. So I decided to be exemplary. Either go absent without leave or go to school. I went to jump school, NCO training school, survival school and all kinds of schools. An then I got attached to a group called the Pathfinders.

D: What were the Pathfinders?
G: Because I was an Indian, and the Pathfinders were just that. They were people that would go way ahead of their troops, map out the area and it was part of a recon. Pathfinders were like a scout group. So I was temporarily attached with them a lot of times.

D: Were there any other American Indians in your outfit?
G: No. There was one guy in boot camp that happened to be Oneida from Oneida, New York. His last name was Webster and I think his first name was Stanley. A few years ago he was...like an Area Director for Disabled American Veterans Organization which had its office in Minneapolis. I met him at Indian Summer a couple of years ago. I was standing in my dancing outfit by the Chippewa village and a voice behind me said "Have you seen Sergeant Amour anyplace?
". I turned around and couldn't believe my eyes. He hadn't changed much from when I knew him in boot camp. We probably would've hugged but I had my dancing outfit on and...we talked a lot and relived a lot of our own experiences from then to now. At my permanent duty station at Camp Pendleton, another Indian Marine came. His name was Bunny McCosar. He was a Southwest Indian. Pueblo?
He came to the outfit from Hawaii. It was really nice to have another Indian in the outfit. I was the only Indian there. Closest to me in nationality were a couple of Mexican guys and a guy who was Spanish. We sort of formed our own brown click.

D: When did you start carrying the flag as a veteran?
G: Oh, I don't know, a few years ago. I came out of retirement. In other words, I started dancing again. I hadn't danced since I was a little kid, 14 or 15. I decided about 4 or 5 years ago to dance again before I couldn't dance anymore. The drums during a powwow...you get itchy...when I hear a drum I don't just want to sit there. So I spoke to my friend Vern Martin and said "I think its about the time I started dancing again." So jointly we kind of...in a competitive way, started putting together our dancing outfits.

D: Do you like carrying the flag?
G: Its an honor and I feel humbled and proud anytime somebody asks me to carry a flag or if somebody asks me if I would be a head dancer. That is a great honor, great responsibility.

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When I conducted these interviews I really had no preconceived notions about what I would find. One of the significant things that I learned was that being in the military changes peoples lives. It is a rite of passage that many people have never experienced.

War is something that school children learn about only in connection with dates and places. The emotional aspects are completely foreign to them and to many of us who have never been to war or lived through one.

The commitment and contributions of Native Americans in the United States Military service are astounding. They have served in the United States military since the American Revolution. During the Civil War, there were 3 Confederate units and 1 Union unit primarily made up of Native Americans from the Oklahoma tribes. Two of the most well-known Native American military men at this time were Eli S. Parker and Stand Watie. Ely S. Parker, a Seneca from New York, was the military assistant to General Ulysses S. Grant. Stand Watie, a Cherokee, was the last Confederate Brigadier General to surrender to the Union troops. In World War I, many Native Americans were so eager to join that they went to Canada to enlist before the United States entered the war. 6,000 of the more than 8,000 who served during this war were volunteers. It was this tremendous act of patriotism that persuaded Congress to pass the Indian Citizenship Act in 1924. During World War II, 25,000 Native American men and women fought on all fronts in Europe and Asia, receiving more than 71 Air Medals, 51 Silver Stars, 47 Bronze Stars, 34 Distinguished Flying Crosses and two Congressional Medals of Honor. In the Vietnam War more than 41, 500 Native Americans enlisted to serve in the United States Armed Forces. Of those 90% were volunteers, giving Native Americans the highest record of service of any ethnic group in the country. In 1990, prior to Operation Desert Storm, some 24,000 Native American men and women were in the military. Approximately 3,000 served in the Persian Gulf. One of every four Native American males is a military veteran.

Native Americans went into the military for a variety of reasons. To uphold the warrior tradition, economic reasons, personal reasons, the draft, or a combination were the usual reasons given. Those who could not enlist, either because of age or the fact that they couldn't speak English, served on the homefront in a variety of capacities on military bases or in factories. They raised larger crops to feed more people and gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to the war effort. The numbers that served are surprising considering the often precarious relationship between the United States government and the sovereign nations. But Native Americans were not merely defending America as we know it but as America as they knew it. It was their land, their culture, their history, their friends and relations that they were fighting for but we both believed in something that was bigger than the individual; that was worth preserving and worth dying for.