🚀 go-pugleaf

Well Bob's your uncle!

That Cheif Seattle speech that gets overused so much was written by a 
Baptist propagandist in the late 60's or early 70's.

Jim Slotek wrote:

> Magazine: Cineaste, December 1999
> 
> Section: RACE IN CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN CINEMA: PART 10
> 
> IRON EYES CODY: WANNABE INDIAN
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Who would have thought that Americas most recognizable Indian face was
> really that of a second-generation Italian-American from Louisiana?
> Iron Eyes Cody became a national icon as a result of playing the
> teary-eyed Indian in the "Keep America Beautiful" public-service
> television spots in 1971. His feathered headdress, dark complexion,
> and braided wig became the embodiment of the noble Indian. No one
> thought to question his claim that his mother was a Cree from Northern
> Canada and his father an Oklahoma Cherokee named Thomas Long Plume.
> 
> Little wonder, then, that newspapers balked when the New Orleans
> Times-Picayune revealed in 1996 that the actor's ethnic origins lay
> deep within the state's Italian immigrant history. When Cody died on
> January 4, 1999, his numerous sentimental obituaries rarely even
> hinted at his make-believe Indian persona. The New York Times pointed
> to the question of Cody's Italian-American roots near the end of his
> obituary, then noted that he had denied it. The Associated Press
> described Cody as "one of the best known Native-American actors." The
> Los Angeles Times parroted Cody's heavily fictionalized autobiography,
> My Life as a Hollywood Indian, and devoted lengthy descriptions to his
> ostensible Oklahoma youth and silent-screen career with directors like
> James Cruze and John Ford (Cody didn't appear in movies until the late
> 1920s). The Times (London) mentioned in its obituary that Cody might
> be of Italian descent. The paper's terse response: "Cody vigorously
> denied this slur." A few publications did relate the Times-Picayune
> story, albeit to a specialized readership. The Hollywood Reporter
> devoted one paragraph to Cody's Italian heritage in its regular
> "E-Mail" column, and New Times, Los Angeles's weekly muckraking
> newspaper, dedicated nearly 8,000 words to his obscure Louisiana past.
> 
> Hollywood's "veteran Indian actor," as The Washington Post described
> Cody shortly after his death, was actually a full-blooded Italian.
> Born Oscar DeCorti on April 3, 1904, in Kaplan, Louisiana, Cody was
> second of four children to Francesca Salpietra and Antonio DeCorti,
> both southern-Italian immigrants who arrived in New Orleans at the
> turn of the century. By 1909, Antonio, a poor grocery merchant living
> with his family in Gueydan, ran afoul of the notorious 'Black Hand
> Society' and fled to Texas. Francesca never saw him again. She soon
> remarried Alton Abshire, a native Louisianan whose ancestors had
> immigrated from Nova Scotia. Francesca bore five more children, and
> one of them, May Abshire Duhon, recalled growing up with little Oscar.
> "He always said he wanted to be an Indian," May told the
> Times-Picayune. "If he could find something that looked Indian, he'd
> put it on." Playing Indian apparently ran in the family: both of
> Cody's brothers, Joseph and Frank, donned breechcloth and war bonnets
> for their bit roles in Hollywood Westerns.
> 
> Indeed, Cody was acceptable as an Indian, even among Native Americans.
> But many suspected the actor's guise, and a few Indian organizations
> publicly so stated it. Indian Country Today--the nation's leading
> Indian newspaper--reprinted the Times-Picayune story against the
> objections of Cody's loyal Native-American friends. The First
> Americans in the Arts (Hollywood's Native-American equivalent to the
> Oscars) pointed out Cody's non-Native status when they gave him their
> prestigious Trustee Award at their annual ceremony in 1995. LA's daily
> newspapers, on the other hand, never touched the issue of Cody's
> heritage, although many Indians wondered why it took so long for white
> people to figure it out.
> 
> But Cody was more than just another Hollywood "fake Indian." The movie
> industry certainly had seen its share of Indian wannabes: Buffalo
> Child Long Lance, star of the 1930 classic, The Silent Enemy, wrote a
> biography detailing his life on the plains as a Blackfoot Indian. But
> many years after his death, a Canadian historian revealed that Long
> Lance was actually Sylvester Clark Long from the African-American
> neighborhoods of Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Silent screen actress
> Mona Darkfeather, often touted as a Seminole Indian, was really
> Josephine M. Workman of the famous Workman and Temple Family Homestead
> near Los Angeles. She was married to director Frank Montgomery, and
> her ancestors were from Great Britain.
> 
> Unlike his make-believe predecessors, Cody actually lived and breathed
> Indian. He pledged his life to Native-American causes, and friends
> recalled extravagant gifts of clothing and food to nearby
> reservations. In 1936, Cody married Bertha Parker, daughter of
> renowned Seneca anthropologist Arthur C. Parker. Bertha, twice married
> before she met Iron Eyes, worked as an archaeologist's assistant at
> the Southwest Museum in Los Angeles. Her extensive knowledge of Indian
> culture proved valuable, for she and Cody became Hollywood's
> celebrated "Indian couple" and Native-American experts. They even
> adopted two Indian boys (Robert and the late Arthur) and opened an
> Indian museum in the basement of their Silverlake bungalow near
> Griffith Park. Rarely did Cody leave home without his braided wig,
> beaded moccasins, and buckskin jacket.
> 
> 
> "Stuart O. Bronstein" <sablaw@sbcglobal.net> wrote in message news:<3C167686.ADDDC76@sbcglobal.net>...
> 
>>veruca3rd@yahoo.com wrote:
>>
>>>stevebo@onramp.net wrote:
>>>
>> 
>>
>>>>I feel like the Indian in the Keep America Beautiful commercial.
>>>>
>>>DId you know the "Indian" was played by an actor of Italian origin?
>>>
>>Actually, you're thinking of the guy who played the Chief in F Troop. 
>>The guy in that ad really was a (as the politically correct say) Native
>>American.
>>
>>Stu
>>