Black Elk
In its heyday of producing movies set in the west it was customary for Hollywood to portray Indians as measuring time by the passage of summers, or full moons for shorter periods. In fact the Sioux measured the years by the passage of winters, and Black Elk, according to Lakota tradition, was born in the winter when the “four Crows were killed on the Tongue River.” The Crows referred to are not birds, but members of the Crow tribe, traditional enemies of the Lakota. The winter refers to the winter of 1863, and Black Elk was likely born in what is now Wyoming.
He was both a mystic, what was known as a medicine man, and a warrior. Black Elk was prone to having visions beginning as a young boy, and throughout his life these visions would shape his opinions of what was best for the Lakota and for the rest of the Sioux nation. As a healer and medicine man Black Elk’s influence among the Sioux was strong among the warriors and children, but less so with the tribal leaders, including Crazy Horse, who was often dismissive of the visions described by Black Elk. Black Elk was present at the Little Big Horn, but not engaged as a warrior, and his later descriptions of the battle changed over time.
Black Elk traveled to Canada with Sitting Bull’s followers, later returning to American territory and the Pine Ridge reservation in 1881. In 1886 he joined Buffalo Bill’s Travelling Wild West Show on a trip to England after some appearances in the United States. He was back at Pine Ridge by 1889, and joined the Ghost Shirt movement espoused by Sitting Bull. The Ghost Shirts believed that their rituals would create a spiritual force which would drive the whites off the Sioux lands, and when concerned US authorities moved to arrest some of the movement’s leaders it led to the death of Sitting Bull. Two weeks following his death Black Elk was injured trying to retaliate following the Battle of Wounded Knee.
Black Elk surrendered for the final time shortly after and returned to Pine Ridge, where he converted to Catholicism, under the name of Nicholas Black Elk. His first wife was a Catholic but Black Elk did not convert to Catholicism until after her death in 1903. He remarried in 1905, to a widow with two children with whom he had three more children. Between his two marriages he was the father of six, and stepfather of two. In the 1930s he began producing a show along the lines of those presented by Buffalo Bill. It was held in the Black Hills, and presented the peaceful culture of the Lakota, rather than the warrior culture depicted elsewhere.
Late in life Black Elk dictated many of his visions and his interpretations of them to several writers, the most prominent result of which is the book Black Elk Speaks written by John Neihardt, although Black Elk’s words were interpreted by Black Elk’s son and recorded and edited by Neihardt’s daughter. Black Elk could not correct the final result. The book has been frequently cited as a source for studying and understanding the spirituality of the Sioux and the American Indian generally, particularly by proponents of the American Indian Movement (AIM). Black Elk died in 1950.