The most influential intertribal organization in Alaska before statehood, the Alaska Native Brotherhood is established to improve tribes’ social conditions and increase their political power. Although the group presents itself as representing all Alaskan natives, the majority of members are from the Tlingit and Haida tribes. Initially, the Alaska Native Brotherhood (ANB) is most concerned with obtaining citizenship for Alaska Natives, but it will increasingly focus its attention on protecting fishing rights and promoting land claims.
“To survive at all [the Indian] must become as other men, a contributing, self-sustaining member of society. This does not mean, necessarily, the loss of individuality, but the asserting of it. The true aim of educational effort should not be to make the Indian a white man, but simply a man normal to his environment. Every Indian who has succeeded is such a person. Hundreds of Indians have attained honorable positions and are. . . in reality are the only Indians who can appreciate the true dignity and value of their race, and they alone are able to speak for it.”
—Society of the American Indian member Arthur C. Parker at the association’s first conference
Jim Thorpe wins two Olympic gold medals.
At the Fifth Olympiad in Stockholm, Sweden, 24-year-old Sac and Fox Indian Jim Thorpe thrills the audience by his amazing performance in two of the most grueling Olympic events—the decathlon and the pentathlon. Already a national sports star for his achievements on the football team of the Carlisle Indian school (see entry for AUTUMN 1879), Thorpe becomes world famous by winning the gold medal in both events. The Olympic crowd cheers wildly as Thorpe is given his awards by Swedish monarch Gustav V, who says to him, “Sir, you are the greatest athlete in the world.” With a characteristic lack of pretension, Thorpe replies, “, King.” (See also entry for JANUARY 1913.)
Louis Tawanima is awarded an Olympic silver medal.
Louis Tawanima, a Hopi Indian from the village of Shungopovi, comes in second in the Stockholm Olympics’ 10,000-meter run. Four years earlier, Tawanima had competed in the Olympic Games in London, where he finished ninth in the marathon. In 1957 he will become the first athlete voted into the Arizona Hall of Fame.
World History
