MARLON BRANDO (1924-2004) - after earlier cursory contacts - initiated his sustained commitment to American Indian people and an Indian Cause with days attendance at the annual meeting of the National Indian Youth Council (NIYC) at Fort Duschesne, Utah, in August 1963 prior to departure for the March 28 March of Washington with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King. He met again with NIYC from Christmas thru New Years Day (1963-64) in Denver CO at offices of United Scholarship Service (USS) directed by Tillie Walker (Mandan-Hidatsa). as newly joined by Vine V. Deloria, Jr. (Standing Rock Sioux). NIYC then announced its "National Campaign of Indian Awareness" and plans for direct action in support of Indian treaty rights and Indians acting already in their defense. Later in January 1954 Brando traveled to New York City with NIYC leaders Mel Thom {Paiute}, Clyde Warrior {Ponca}, and Bruce Wilkie for interviews with an "international press" and then to Washington, D.C. for meetings of the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) in discussion of Indian support for the 1964 Civil Rights Act and an Indian role in the civil rights movement. NIYC had already initiated a mobilization of Pacific Northwest Indian Tribes for an Indian march on the Washington Capitol in Olympia and to join Indian fishermen and their families engaged in off-reservation salmon net fishing under treaty rights considered "illegal" by the State. Plans to join "The Renegade" fishermen at Franks Landing were diverted at last minute in favor of Marlon Brando's fishing with treaty Indians on the Puyallup and Quillayute Rivers - as shown in this video. Marlon was arrested on the Puyallup, along with Episcopal Rev. John Yaryan and long-time rights defender Robert "Bob" Satiacum. BUFFY SAINTE MARIE, who served from 1965 on the National Advisory Board to UPWARD BOUND, U.S. Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) which created a National UPWARD BOUND Indian Advisory Committee comprised primarily of NIYC and USS directors and staff members. Ms. Sainte-Marie provided multiple Cleveland and Seattle benefit performances in behalf of Nisqually and Puyallup Indian fishermen and the Survival of American Indians Association (SAIA). In visiting Franks Landing and Nisqually River with Basketball Hall of Fame's Elvin Hayes, Buffy composed and sang a new song dedicated to the treaty fishermen - also heard in the SAIA 1971 film, "As Long As the Rivers Run" (Carol Burns, filmmaker). Ms. Sainte-Marie also contributed music to a two-hour documentary produced by ITV-Thames Television of London - notably in "Treaties Made, Treaties Broken," when the original was segmented into three parts for U.S. distribution. Two of her songs, "Now The Buffalo Are Gone" and "My Country Tis of Thy People __."

• published: 05 Nov 2013
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