Mankiller, Wilma Pearl, 1945-2010

Wilma Pearl Mankiller was born November 18, 1945, in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, and became the
first woman chief of a Native American tribe in modern history. She served as Deputy and
Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation, and throughout her career spoke out for the rights of Native
Americans. An ardent activist and feminist, Mankiller was inducted into the Oklahoma Women's
Hall of Fame (1986), the International Women's Forum Hall of Fame (1992), the National Women's
Hall of Fame (1993), and has received the Distinguished Leadership Award of the Harvard
Foundation. In addition, she was chosen as one of the Fifty Great Americans by Who's Who. She is
the author of Mankiller: A Chief and Her People, and co-editor of The Reader's Companion to the
History of Women in the United States. She passed away in 2010 at age 64 from pancreatic cancer.
Collection Summary (45 box

Wilma Pearl Mankiller (Cherokee: ᎠᏥᎳᏍᎩ ᎠᏍᎦᏯᏗᎯ, romanized: Atsilasgi Asgayadihi; November 18, 1945 – April 6, 2010) was a Native American (Cherokee Nation) activist, social worker, community developer and the first woman elected to serve as Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation. Born in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, she lived on her family's allotment in Adair County, Oklahoma, until the age of 11, when her family relocated to San Francisco as part of a federal government program to urbanize Native Americans. After high school, she married a well-to-do Ecuadorian and raised two daughters. Inspired by the social and political movements of the 1960s, Mankiller became involved in the Occupation of Alcatraz and later participated in the land and compensation struggles with the Pit River Tribe. For five years in the early 1970s, she was employed as a social worker, focusing mainly on children's issues.

Returning to Oklahoma in the fall of 1976, Mankiller was hired by the Cherokee Nation as an economic stimulus coordinator. With her expertise at preparing documentation, she became a successful grant writer, and by the early 1980s was directing the newly created Community Development Department of the Cherokee Nation. As Director she designed and supervised innovative community projects allowing rural citizens to identify their own challenges and, through their labor, participate in solving them. Her project in Bell, Oklahoma, was featured in the movie The Cherokee Word for Water, directed by Charlie Soap and Tim Kelly. In 2015, the movie was selected as the top American Indian film of the past 40 years by the American Indian Film Institute.[1] Her project in Kenwood received the Department of Housing and Urban Development's Certificate of National Merit.

Her management ability came to the notice of the incumbent Principal Chief, Ross Swimmer, who invited her to run as his deputy in the 1983 tribal elections. When the duo won, she became the first elected woman to serve as Deputy Chief of the Cherokee Nation. In 1985, when Swimmer took a position in the federal administration of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, she was elevated to Principal Chief, serving until 1995. During her administration, the Cherokee government built new health clinics, created a mobile eye-care clinic, established ambulance services, and created early education, adult education and job training programs. She developed revenue streams, including factories, retail stores, restaurants and bingo operations, while establishing self-governance, allowing the tribe to manage its own finances.

When she retired from politics, Mankiller returned to her activist role as an advocate working to improve the image of Native Americans and combat the misappropriation of native heritage, by authoring books including a bestselling autobiography, Mankiller: A Chief and Her People, and giving numerous lectures on health care, tribal sovereignty, women's rights and cancer awareness. Throughout her life, she had serious health problems, including polycystic kidney disease, myasthenia gravis, lymphoma and breast cancer, and needed two kidney transplants. She died in 2010 from pancreatic cancer, and was honored with many local, state and national awards, including the nation's highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

In 2021 it was announced that Mankiller's likeness would appear on the quarter-dollar coin[2] as a part of the United States Mint's "American Women Quarters" program.[3]

Wilma Pearl Mankiller was born on November 18, 1945, in the Hastings Indian Hospital in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, to Clara Irene (née Sutton) and Charley Mankiller.[4][5] Her father was a full-blooded Cherokee,[4][6] whose ancestors had been forced to relocate to Indian Territory from Tennessee over the Trail of Tears in the 1830s. The small house had no electricity or plumbing[20] and they lived in "extreme poverty".[10] The family hunted and fished, maintaining a vegetable garden to feed themselves. They also grew peanuts and strawberries, which they sold.[14] Mankiller went to school through the fifth grade in a three-room schoolhouse, in Rocky Mountain.[21][22] The family spoke both English and Cherokee at home; even Mankiller's mother spoke Cherokee.[21] Her mother canned food and used flour sacks to make clothes for the children,[14][21] whom she immersed in Cherokee heritage. Though they joined the Baptist church, the children were wary of white congregants and customs, preferring to attend tribal ceremonial gatherings.[23] Family elders taught the children traditional stories.[24]

n 1964, a small group of Red Power activists occupied Alcatraz Island for a few hours.[40][41] In the late 1960s, a group of students from the University of California at Berkeley, Los Angeles and Santa Cruz, along with students at San Francisco State, began protesting against the Vietnam War and in favor of civil rights for ethnic minorities and women.[42][43] Among the groups that sprang up in the period was the American Indian Movement (AIM), which in San Francisco was centered around the activities at the San Francisco Indian Center.[43] Also meeting there was the United Bay Indian Council, which operated as an umbrella organization for 30 separate groups representing people of different tribal affiliations. In October 1969, the Center burned, and the loss of their meeting place created a bond between administrators and student activists, who combined their efforts to bring the plight of urban Native Americans to the public eye with the reoccupation of Alcatraz.[44]

The occupation inspired Mankiller to become involved in civil rights activism.[40][45] Prior to the November takeover of the island, she had not been involved in either AIM or the United Bay Council. She began to meet with other Native Americans who had participated in the Indian Center, becoming active in the groups supporting the Occupation.[46] While she did visit Alcatraz, most of her work focused on fundraising and support, gathering supplies of blankets, food and water for those on the island.[47] Soon after the Occupation began, Charley Mankiller was diagnosed with kidney disease, which caused Mankiller to discover that she shared polycystic kidney disease with her father.[48] In between her activism, school and family obligations, she spent as much time with him as she was able.[49] The Occupation lasted 19 months,[50] and during that time, Mankiller learned organizational skills and how to do paralegal research.[45] She had been encouraged by other activists to continue her studies, and began planning a career ...