Native American Obituaries
Wahacanka Peltier, the youngest child of imprisoned Leonard Peltier, walked on while on a trip to the nation’s capital where hundreds are gathering this weekend in a prayer vigil to free his father. Wahacanka Peltier was 41.
A prominent Kicked In The Belly chief, war leader, and reservation-era chief, Joseph "Joe" Medicine Crow was a Crow Elder, the last surviving war chief of the Crow tribe, tribal historian, and the first of his tribe to become a university educated anthropologist. Medicine Crow died Sunday, April 3, 2016 at the age of 102 at a hospice house in Billings, Montana. A half-sister, Louella Whiteman Runs Him Johnson, confirmed his death and said she did not know the cause.
On December 8, 2015, American Indian activist, spoken word artist and poet, actor and visionary John Trudell walked on surrounded by his family and friends at his home in Santa Clara County, California, after a battle with cancer. He was 69.
When a loved one dies, many times paying funeral bills can be a financial burden. However, that burden can be lifted or eased by the Cherokee Nation’s Burial Assistance Program, which helps citizens of federally recognized tribes pay funeral expenses.
The language he once was punished for speaking in school became Chester Nez's primary weapon in World War II. He was the last surviving Navajo Code Talker.
Ruth Ziolkowski, who has died aged 87 after a prolonged struggle with cancer, spent much of her life helping her husband, the Polish-American sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski, to achieve his dream of transforming a mountain in the Black Hills of South Dakota into a colossal sculpture depicting the 19th-century Oglala Lakota war chief Crazy Horse.