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Wilma Mankiller

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Woman of Color Project on
Wilma Mankiller

My presentation is on Wilma Mankiller, the Cherokee Nations first female Indian Chief
Can a young Cherokee girl grow up to be a Chief? Before Wilma Mankiller grew up to be her tribe’s chosen leader many Indian girls believed that answer to be no. Wilma had a lot to overcome personally in order to be a leader as Wilma was a shy and quiet person who didn’t like to speak in public or talk in front of a camera. One day while driving along the reservation, Wilma saw something that changed her mind. Looking at the plight of her people from an outsiders view, Wilma decided she needed to do something to help her people become the great people she knew they could become. Overcoming her shyness, Wilma set out to campaign her way to deputy chief a step just below Chief. Why wouldn’t she win?
It wasn’t easy for Wilma in the beginning. Many Cherokees didn’t want to be governed by a woman; only “good ole boys” could run the Cherokee Nation. Even though Indian women had always been medicine women, warriors and council members, basically having equal rights to the men, people were talking behind her back and not happy with a woman becoming chief. She had to endure slashed tires and even death threats. Wilma believed sexism was the white man’s culture and it was creeping into the Indian culture. She set out to prove them wrong.
When Wilma was only ten, her whole family was relocated to California as part of a Federal Government’s relocation policy. Wilma went from having no running water to being thrust into a California lifestyle not accustomed to Indians. Televisions, neon lights, elevators, these things were all foreign to Wilma and her family. Wilma was stereotyped as being “black, nigger, poor, etc”. Eventually Wilma settled into the California lifestyle, went to school and married. They had two girls together which brought a new meaning to Wilma’s life. She was proud of being Indian and having two girls that had Indian blood running through their veins. Becoming a mother made Wilma very aware of politics and just how awful the Indians were being treated. All of this injustice came to a head one night when some Indian university students began protesting at Alcatraz to attract attention to what was going on with the Indian’s and their tribes. Something changed her on that night of the Alcatraz protest and from then (1969) on, Wilma became an active activist fighting for Indian rights.
Wilma began volunteering for Tribes all the while living in California. She devoted her time to treaty issues, worked on legal issues regarding ancestral land issues, and became the Director of the Native American Youth Center. It was at the Youth Center that Wilma began her basic belief of the essential quality of self help. Her activism continued with the five years she and her two daughters spent working on/with the Pit River People in a legal battle with an electrical company over land rights. This form of activism was grooming Wilma to become the leader she would one day become. While this community work was fulfilling to Wilma, it wasn’t for her husband as he wanted a traditional wife. Subsequently they divorced and Wilma moved back to Oklahoma with her two daughters.
Living on her own ancestral land made Wilma very happy but not content. . She spent the next three years studying for her college degree and raising her two children. Early one morning while coming home from class, Wilma was involved in a head on collision with another car. The other car crossed into Wilma’s lane and hit her head on. Unfortunately the driver of the other car died and Wilma was very seriously injured. To make matters even worse, the driver of the other car was Wilma’s best friend. This accident became a sort of spiritual awakening and yet another turning point in Wilma’s life. A year of convalescing at home made Wilma a “being of good mind” spirit. As is with Wilma’s life, the rest part was not to last for long as she became very sick with a chronic neuromuscular disease that causes weakness in muscles in one’s body. To overcome this illness, Wilma had to have her Thymus gland removed. All of these “brushes with death” might have broken a woman’s spirit but it only fueled the fire for Wilma. Wilma realized this gave her the strength to take on projects she wouldn’t have thought she was capable of doing.
Wilma never played the woman card during her campaign speeches. She only wanted what was best for her Indian people and her being a woman had nothing to do with her feelings as a woman. Once voting took place, it was Wilma who was voted into office as Deputy Chief right under Cherokee Chief Ross Swimmer. Two years later Chief Ross Swimmer resigned his post and took up office in Washington DC. Swimmer’s resignation left Wilma as the Chief of the Cherokee Nation, a position Ross Swimmer knew she was designed for doing. Two years after Ross Swimmer resigned, Wilma won reelection on her own and again later on down the road.
Monetary accomplishments for Wilma include an $11 million job corps center in Tahlequah OK, a homeless shelter for youths of all ages and races, obtained special state taxation laws governing the tribes businesses when operated on land placed in a trust, led a team that obtained funding for free rural health care clinics, founding director of the Cherokee Nation Community Development Department which utilizes self-help projects, something very dear to her heart.
Although not all of Wilma’s accomplishments were monetary, Wilma had opened the door for a new gender to run the Cherokee Nation. She is truly a woman empowering women which has placed her in a class along with Harriet Tubman, Maya Angelou, Corretta Scott King, and my favorite, Benazir Bhutto.

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