Crow Tribe Elder, Historian Joe Medicine Crow Dead at 102 (New York Times)

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By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

APRIL 3, 2016, 6:36 P.M. E.D.T.

BILLINGS, Mont. — Joseph Medicine Crow, an acclaimed Native American historian and last surviving war chief of Montana’s Crow Tribe, has died. He was 102.

Medicine Crow died Sunday, Bullis Mortuary funeral home director Terry Bullis said. Services will be announced Monday, he said.

A member of the Crow Tribe’s Whistling Water clan, Medicine Crow was raised by his grandparents in a log house in a rural area of the Crow Reservation near Lodge Grass, Montana.

His Crow name was “High Bird,” and he recalled listening as a child to stories about the Battle of Little Bighorn from those who were there, including his grandmother’s brother, White Man Runs Him, a scout for Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer.

His grandfather, Yellowtail, raised Medicine Crow to be a warrior. The training began when Medicine Crow was just 6 or 7, with a punishing physical regimen that included running barefoot in the snow to toughen the boy’s feet and spirit.

Medicine Crow in 1939 became the first of his tribe to receive a master’s degree, in anthropology. He served for decades as a Crow historian, cataloging his people’s nomadic history by collecting firsthand accounts of pre-reservation life from fellow tribal members.

“I always told people, when you meet Joe Medicine Crow, you’re shaking hands with the 19th century,” said Herman Viola, curator emeritus at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American Indians.

During World War II, Medicine Crow earned the title of war chief after performing a series of daring deeds, including stealing horses from an enemy encampment and hand-to-hand combat with a German soldier whose life Medicine Crow ultimately spared.

“Warfare was our highest art, but Plains Indian warfare was not about killing. It was about intelligence, leadership, and honor,” Medicine Crow wrote in his 2006 book “Counting Coup.”

Soon after returning from the European front, Medicine Crow was designated tribal historian by the Crow Tribal Council.

With his prodigious memory, Medicine Crow could accurately recall decades later the names, dates and exploits from the oral history he was exposed to as a child, Viola said. Those included tales told by four of the six Crow scouts who were at Custer’s side at Little Bighorn and who Medicine Crow knew personally.

Yet Medicine Crow also embraced the changes that came with the settling of the West, and he worked to bridge his people’s cultural traditions with the opportunities of modern society. His voice became familiar to many outside the region as the narrator for American Indian exhibits in major museums across the country.

“He really wanted to walk in both worlds, the white world and Indian world, and he knew education was a key to success,” said Viola, who first met Medicine Crow in 1972 and collaborated with him on several books.

Gov. Steve Bullock said Medicine Crow was an inspiration to his tribe and others.

“Joe was a Crow war chief, veteran, elder, historian, author, and educator. His legacy will forever serve as an inspiration for all Native Americans — and all Montanans,” he said.

U.S. Sen. Steve Daines said Medicine Crow was a good leader and the first member of the Crow Tribe to attain a master’s degree.

“Medicine Crow’s spirit, humility and life achievements leave a lasting imprint on Montana’s history,” Daines said.

President Barack Obama awarded Medicine Crow the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009.

During the White House ceremony, Obama referred to Medicine Crow as “a good man, a ‘bacheitche’ in Crow.”

“(His) life reflects not only the warrior spirit of the Crow people, but America’s highest ideals,” Obama said.

He was nominated for the Congressional Gold Medal and was awarded honorary doctoral degrees from the University of Southern California and Montana’s Rocky Mountain College.

In the years leading to his death, Medicine Crow continued to live with his family in Lodge Grass. His wife died in 2009. Even after his hearing and eyesight faded, Medicine Crow continued to lecture into his 90s on the Battle of Little Bighorn and other major events in Crow history.

Agora a versão portuguesa:

Morreu o último chefe índio dos Estados Unidos (RTP)

[Esse título é uma piada. Não é de estranhar que o jornalista português não saiba o mínimo necessário para falar sobre indígenas sem cometer o erro absurdo de considera-lo o “último” chefe índio, uma vez que os jornalistas brasileiros, que estão tão próximos das populações indígenas, tampouco sejam capazes de evitar tais gafes.-RT]

RTP 04 Abr, 2016, 15:38 / atualizado em 04 Abr, 2016, 15:50 | Cultura

Morreu o último chefe índio dos Estados Unidos

O presidente Obama, ao condecorar Joe Medicine Crow em 2009, debatendo-se com uma pena que lhe entrou pelo nariz. Foto:  Jim Young, Reuters

Joseph Medicine Crow, último chefe da tribo Crow, morreu com 102 anos de idade. Embora tenha nascido em 1913, era considerado uma memória viva do século XIX.

 Joseph Medicine Crow foi educado para ser um guerreiro, absorveu na sua tribo as narrativas de feitos heróicos, em especial a batalha nas margens do rio Little Bighorn, em 1876. Ouviu essas narrativas de guerreiros índios que ainda tinham participado na batalha. Recordavam-na como rara vitória que fora, dos índios sobre as tropas brancas, ocasionada pela aliança entre cheyennes e sioux, contra a prática do general George Armstrong Custer, que habitualmente massacrava aldeias índias inteiras.

Custer, retratado sem contemplações no filme Little Big Man, protagonizado por Dustin Hoffman, foi morto na batalha, juntamente com mais de duas centenas de militares norte-americanos.

Na reserva de Lodge Grass, Montana, Joseph Medicine Crow foi treinado desde os seis anos de idade pelo seu avô, Cauda Amarela, para continuar as proezas guerreiras de chefes como Touro Sentado e Cavalo Louco, os dois líderes das tribos coligadas para a vitória de Little Bighorn. O avô fazia-o correr descalço sobre a neve, para criar resistências.

Segundo a nota publicada no New York Times por ocasião da sua morte, Medicine Crow seguiu, contudo, um outro caminho, numa época em que a resistência à ocupação branca já tinha terminado. Foi um dos primeiros índios estudarem e licenciou-se em antropologia em 1939. Mas depois veio a Segunda Guerra Mundial e voltou a emergir Crow, o guerreiro índio.

Entre os seus feitos de guerra conta-se o de roubar cavalos num acampamento inimigo e o de vencer em combate corpo-a-corpo um soldado alemão, a quem finalmente decidiu poupar a vida. Num livro publicado em 2006, Medicine Crow explicava que “fazer a guerra é a nossa arte suprema; mas para os índios da planície fazer a guerra não consiste em matar. É tudo uma questão de inteligência, de liderança e de honra”.

Quando voltou da guerra na frente europeia, Joseph Medicine Crow foi nomeado pelo conselho tribal como historiador da tribo. Diz-se que era dotado de uma memória prodigiosa e que conseguia, muitos anos depois, reproduzir grande parte das conversas que tivera com seis batedores índios que chegara a conhecer e que estiveram ao serviço do general Custer na batalha de Little Bighorn.

O empenhamento de Medicine Crow em cultivar as tradições da sua tribo como parte integrante de uma nação americana resultante do extermínio da população indígena valeu-lhe numerosos louvores e condecorações, mais recentemente por parte do presidente Barack Obama. Entre os elogios fúnebres que lhe fizeram os seus conterrâneos conta-se o do senador Steve Daines, nestas palavras algo ambíguas: “O espírito de Medicine Crow, a sua humildade e as realizações da sua vida, deixam uma marca duradoura na história de Montana”.