Biographies
This page talks about major leaders of the American Indian Movement.
Russell Means
Russell Means was born 10th of November 1939 in South Dakota. In the year 1942, Russell was three years old when their family resettled in San Francisco escaping the poverty and difficulties of the reservation. He attended public schools in Vallejo and San Leandro wherein he faced racism, bad grades, and he barely graduated high school. Means experienced an awful childhood. His father was an alcoholic. Russell Means was also accounted to experimenting on drugs, crime, and alcohol before finding purpose in the American Indian Movement.
Russell Means was an actor, an activist, and a libertarian political activist. He was the first national director of the AIM wherein he became noticed during the standoff with the U.S. government at Wounded Knee. Means joined the Libertarian Party and announced his candidacy for the party’s presidential nomination. He believes that whoever was born in America, is called a Native American. Mr. Means cut off his braids a few months before he found out about his cancer diagnosis. He said it was a gesture of mourning for his people. Means died on the 22nd of October 2012 at Porcupine, South Dakota, U.S.A. due to esophageal cancer.
Picture of Russell Means, arms folded
Russell Means was an actor, an activist, and a libertarian political activist. He was the first national director of the AIM wherein he became noticed during the standoff with the U.S. government at Wounded Knee. Means joined the Libertarian Party and announced his candidacy for the party’s presidential nomination. He believes that whoever was born in America, is called a Native American. Mr. Means cut off his braids a few months before he found out about his cancer diagnosis. He said it was a gesture of mourning for his people. Means died on the 22nd of October 2012 at Porcupine, South Dakota, U.S.A. due to esophageal cancer.
Picture of Russell Means, arms folded
Anna Mae Aquash
Anna Mae Aquash was born on March 27, 1945 to Mary Ellen Pictou and Francis Thomas Levi. She was born in a small Indian village just outside of Nova Scotia, Canada. Her father Francis left before Mary had the chance to give birth to Anna. As a child, Anna spent most of her life living in poverty. When Aquash’s mother married Noel Sapier, it brought discipline and security to the family.
At age 17, Anna moved to Boston with her future husband, Jake Maloney. Together, they found jobs, built a house, and started a family. In 1968, Jake and Anna had divorced and shortly after for a short period of time, Anna became an alcoholic. Two short years later, she became a member of the American Indian Movement. She participated in the Trail of Broken Treaties in 1972, the Wounded Knee Incident in 1973, and worked with the Menominee Warriors Society in 1975. Anna was considered one of the most influential female leaders of this movement.
In February 24th of 1976, Aquash’s body was found on the side of an interstate in South Dakota. An autopsy was done by Dr. W.O. Brown and he thought that she had died of frostbite, failing to recognize a bullet wound in her skull. In March of 2003, Fritz Arlo Looking Cloud and John Graham were convicted of the murder of Anna Mae Aquash.
Picture below is Anna Mae Aquash
At age 17, Anna moved to Boston with her future husband, Jake Maloney. Together, they found jobs, built a house, and started a family. In 1968, Jake and Anna had divorced and shortly after for a short period of time, Anna became an alcoholic. Two short years later, she became a member of the American Indian Movement. She participated in the Trail of Broken Treaties in 1972, the Wounded Knee Incident in 1973, and worked with the Menominee Warriors Society in 1975. Anna was considered one of the most influential female leaders of this movement.
In February 24th of 1976, Aquash’s body was found on the side of an interstate in South Dakota. An autopsy was done by Dr. W.O. Brown and he thought that she had died of frostbite, failing to recognize a bullet wound in her skull. In March of 2003, Fritz Arlo Looking Cloud and John Graham were convicted of the murder of Anna Mae Aquash.
Picture below is Anna Mae Aquash
Dennis Banks
Born: April 12, 1937 Birth place: Leech Lake Indian Reservation, Minnesota
Occupations: Native American Leader, activist, author, teacher, lecturer
Highlight: Co-founded the American Indian Movement in 1968, along with George Mitchell, Eddie Benton-Banai, Clyde Bellecourt, Herb Powless, and Harold Goodsky.
Fun fact: He runs five miles every day.
Born on the Leech Lake Indian Reservation, he was later removed and sent to Native American boarding schools that forbade their language. He co-founded the American Indian Movement in order to fight for Native Americans' basic rights. In 1973, he was involved with the Wounded Knee Incident. Banks was convicted of riot and assault, and ran away to California. Banks was romantically involved with Anna Mae Aquash, a female high leader of AIM, until she was murdered in 1975. In California, governor Jerry Brown defended Banks for his charges, but Banks had to face three years in prison. Banks continued to run AIM later on. Banks appeared in several movies such as "The Last of the Mohicans" and "Older Than America". He has had two marriages and twenty children. He practices Native American traditions and hopes to sustain it.
Picture above is Dennis Banks
Occupations: Native American Leader, activist, author, teacher, lecturer
Highlight: Co-founded the American Indian Movement in 1968, along with George Mitchell, Eddie Benton-Banai, Clyde Bellecourt, Herb Powless, and Harold Goodsky.
Fun fact: He runs five miles every day.
Born on the Leech Lake Indian Reservation, he was later removed and sent to Native American boarding schools that forbade their language. He co-founded the American Indian Movement in order to fight for Native Americans' basic rights. In 1973, he was involved with the Wounded Knee Incident. Banks was convicted of riot and assault, and ran away to California. Banks was romantically involved with Anna Mae Aquash, a female high leader of AIM, until she was murdered in 1975. In California, governor Jerry Brown defended Banks for his charges, but Banks had to face three years in prison. Banks continued to run AIM later on. Banks appeared in several movies such as "The Last of the Mohicans" and "Older Than America". He has had two marriages and twenty children. He practices Native American traditions and hopes to sustain it.
Picture above is Dennis Banks
Billy Frank Jr.
Billy Frank Jr. was born in 1931. His Mom died around the age of ninety and his Dad around one-hundred and four. As a little boy Frank would watch his Dad “riding on a horse with his dad. He’d be five or six years old, standing up on the horse’s rump, holding on to his dad’s shoulders. They’d be riding across the Muck Creek Prairie. The grass would be blowing. I know what it was like, because my dad did it with me when I was a little boy”. These visions began the stories and practices which became his traditions passed down from his Dad, Willie Frank. Willie also took Billy Jr. with him on the canoe to hunt seafood like salmon, oysters, clams, and geoducks. He would watch the ways of hunting.
Billy’s education paused in the end of 9th grade, junior high but continued after finding work in a company. On December 1945 Billy Frank was arrested for fishing in the river of Muck Creek. Within the increasing years more than fifty other tribe members from different groups followed his arrest. In 1952, at the young age of twenty-one, Billy decided to join the Marines as his dream but came back in 1954 to his roots to protect the six acres of land given from his father.
To make fishing right the tribes had their first “fish-in” in 1964 led by the National Indian Youth Council in Olympia. It was demonstrated by the natives to claim their rights given from the treaties. It took about 20 long years but on February 12, 1974, with the help of Hank Adams,Attorney General Slade, and the NIYC (National Indian Youth Council), Billy was able to get the Natives right to fish. Today Billy Frank Jr. is the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission chair and has continued to serve as the chair for 30 years.
Picture above is Billy Frank Jr.
Billy’s education paused in the end of 9th grade, junior high but continued after finding work in a company. On December 1945 Billy Frank was arrested for fishing in the river of Muck Creek. Within the increasing years more than fifty other tribe members from different groups followed his arrest. In 1952, at the young age of twenty-one, Billy decided to join the Marines as his dream but came back in 1954 to his roots to protect the six acres of land given from his father.
To make fishing right the tribes had their first “fish-in” in 1964 led by the National Indian Youth Council in Olympia. It was demonstrated by the natives to claim their rights given from the treaties. It took about 20 long years but on February 12, 1974, with the help of Hank Adams,Attorney General Slade, and the NIYC (National Indian Youth Council), Billy was able to get the Natives right to fish. Today Billy Frank Jr. is the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission chair and has continued to serve as the chair for 30 years.
Picture above is Billy Frank Jr.