Leonard Peltier is a Native American activist and a member of the American Indian Movement (AIM) who, following a controversial trial, was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of two Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents in a June 26, 1975, shooting on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. He was sentenced to two consecutive terms of life imprisonment and has been imprisoned since 1977. Peltier became eligible for parole in 1993. As of 2022, Peltier is incarcerated at the United States Penitentiary, Coleman in Florida.
The American Indian Movement (AIM) is a Native American grassroots movement which was founded in Minneapolis, Minnesota in July 1968, initially centered in urban areas in order to address systemic issues of poverty, discrimination, and police brutality against Native Americans. AIM soon widened its focus from urban issues to many Indigenous Tribal issues that Native American groups have faced due to settler colonialism in the Americas. These issues have included treaty rights, high rates of unemployment, Native American education, cultural continuity, and the preservation of Indigenous cultures.
News From Indian Country was a privately owned newspaper, published once a month in the United States, founded by the journalist Paul DeMain (Ojibwe/Oneida) in 1986, who served as a managing editor and an owner. It was the oldest continuing, nationally distributed publication that was not owned by a tribal government. It offered national, cultural and regional sections, and "the most up-to-date pow-wow directory in the United States and Canada," according to its website. The newspaper was offered both in print and electronic form and has subscribers throughout the United States, Canada and 17 other countries.
A noose is a loop at the end of a rope in which the knot tightens under load and can be loosened without untying the knot. The knot can be used to secure a rope to a post, pole, or animal but only where the end is in a position that the loop can be passed over.
Annie Mae Aquash was a First Nations activist and Mi'kmaq tribal member from Nova Scotia, Canada. Aquash moved to Boston in the 1960s and joined other First Nations and Indigenous Americans focused on education and resistance, and police brutality against urban Indigenous peoples. She was part of the American Indian Movement, participated in several occupations, and participated in the 1973 Wounded Knee incident at the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, United States.
Rigo 23 is a Portuguese-born American muralist, painter, and political artist. He is known in the San Francisco community for having painted a number of large, graphic "sign" murals including: One Tree next to the U.S. Route 101 on-ramp at 10th and Bryant Street, Innercity Home on a large public housing structure, Sky/Ground on a tall abandoned building at 3rd and Mission Street, and Extinct over a Shell gas station. He resides in San Francisco, California.
The John B. Castleman Monument, within the Cherokee Triangle of Louisville, Kentucky, was unveiled on November 8, 1913. The model, selected from a competition to which numerous sculptors contributed, was designed by R. Hinton Perry of New York. The statue was erected to honor John Breckinridge Castleman at a cost of $15,000 by popular subscription from city, state, and other commonwealths. The statue is made of bronze, and rests on a granite pedestal. It stands 15-feet high, with a base of 12×20 feet. The monument was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on July 17, 1997, as part of the Civil War Monuments of Kentucky MPS. There have been attempts to remove the statue since January 2019 due to the fact that Castleman was a Major of the Confederate army. The monument was removed on June 8, 2020, and is pending cleaning and relocation to Castleman's burial site.
Susan Lisa Rosenberg is an American activist, writer, advocate for social justice and prisoners' rights. From the late 1970s into the mid-1980s, Rosenberg was active in the far-left terrorist May 19th Communist Organization ("M19CO") which, according to a contemporaneous FBI report, "openly advocate[d] the overthrow of the U.S. Government through armed struggle and the use of violence". M19CO provided support to an offshoot of the Black Liberation Army, including in armored truck robberies, and later engaged in bombings of government buildings, including the 1983 Capitol bombing.
Robert Eugene Robideau was an American activist who was acquitted in the 1975 shooting deaths of two FBI agents in South Dakota.
Equestrian Statue of Theodore Roosevelt is a 1939 bronze sculpture by James Earle Fraser. It was located on public park land at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. The equestrian statue depicts Theodore Roosevelt on horseback. Walking on either side of him are two men, on one side a Native American and on the other, a sub-Saharan African.
In the Spirit of Crazy Horse is a book by Peter Matthiessen which chronicles "the story of Leonard Peltier and the FBI's war on the American Indian Movement." It was first published in 1983. Leonard Peltier was convicted of murder in 1977 and sentenced to life in prison for the 1975 killing of two FBI agents, after a trial which the author and many others allege was based on fabricated evidence, widespread fraud and government misconduct.
Agents of Repression: The FBI's Secret Wars Against the Black Panther Party and the American Indian Movement is a book by Americans Ward Churchill and Jim Vander Wall, first published in 1988. It describes government campaigns to disrupt the legal political activities of the Black Panther Party and the American Indian Movement, especially through actions of the FBI.
This study gives a chilling account of the government attack against the American Indian Movement and the Black Panther Party, placed in the context of the traditional use of the FBI for domestic political repression. It is a powerful indictment, with far–reaching implications concerning the treatment of political activists, especially those that are Black or Native American, and the functioning of our political institutions generally.
Nicholas Galanin is a Tlingit and Unangax̂ multi-disciplinary artist and musician from Alaska. His work often explores a dialogue of change and identity between Native and non-Native communities.
Edgar Donroy Bear Runner was a Native American activist. He is perhaps best known for parleying with American Indian Movement activists in an attempt to negotiate a peaceful resolution to the standoff which occurred during the Jumping Bull ranch incident in 1975.
The Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee Monument, often referred to simply as the Jackson and Lee Monument or Lee and Jackson Monument, was a double equestrian statue of Confederate generals Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee, formerly located on the west side of the Wyman Park Dell in Charles Village in Baltimore, Maryland, alongside a forested hill, similar to the topography of Chancellorsville, Virginia, where Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee met before the Battle of Chancellorsville in 1863. The statue was removed on August 16, 2017, on the order of Baltimore City Council, but the base still remains. The monument is in storage and some city council members have called for all Confederate monuments in the state to be destroyed.
Frank Blackhorse is one of several aliases used by a member of the American Indian Movement. He is perhaps best known for his participation in the Wounded Knee incident, particularly his role in the shootout that left two FBI and one American Indian dead and for becoming a fugitive on the run who fled to Canada shortly after.
Darlene Nichols, also known by the names Kamook, Ka-Mook, Kamook Nichols and Ka-Mook Nichols, is the name of a former AIM member and Native American protester. She is best known for her role in the American Indian Movement for organizing The Longest Walk, and for serving as a key material witness in the trials of Arlo Looking Cloud, Richard Marshall, and John Graham that ultimately led to the conviction of two AIM members in the murders of Anna Mae Aquash.
Arlo Looking Cloud is a former Native American activist. He is perhaps best known for his involvement with the murder of fellow American Indian Movement activist Anna Mae Aquash.
Throughout its history and into the present, the United States has held political prisoners, people whose detention is based substantially on political motives. Prominent U.S. political prisoners have included anti-war socialists, civil rights movement activists, conscientious objectors, and War on Terrorism detainees.
