Veteran journalist and ICT’s Editor-at-large Mark Trahant, Shoshone-Bannock, is now a hall of famer.
Trahant is among the 2023 National Native American Hall of Fame class. He is one of six to be named and will be inducted in the fall.
The group has made contributions in law, journalism, advocacy, writing and entertainment. Others include former Quinault Indian Nation President Joe DeLaCruz, actor Will Sampson, Muscogee Creek, novelist and poet Leslie Marmon Silko, Laguna Pueblo, American Indian Lawyer Training program founder Richard Trudell, Santee Dakota and Native rights advocate LaNada Means War Jack, Shoshone-Bannock.
“When I think about my career, I am overwhelmed by how much luck I have had,” Trahant said in a statement. “I have been at the right place at the right time, so, so often. Sometimes it was by assignment, but many times it was serendipity; I just happened to be where news was happening. I have also been fortunate to be up close and observe many of the great Indigenous leaders of the 20th century — including those honored by the Native American Hall of Fame.”
The hall of fame was established in 2016 by James Parker Shield. With the new inductees, nearly 50 change makers have been named to the hall of fame, including ICT founder Tim Giago, Oglala Lakota. The hall also includes Forrest Gerard, a mentor of Trahant’s. It is located at the First Americans Museum in Oklahoma City.
Trahant is the author of three books and is working on a fourth about the impact of Native women as leaders.
Five years ago, he took on a defunct Indian Country Today and helped turn it into what it is today.
“The story of ICT is perhaps the most important chapter yet,” he said. “That story began five years ago as a salvage mission — preserving a crucial voice for Indian Country — and now ICT and its owner, IndiJ Public Media, represent an independent, thriving venture that is creating a new path to give young people the journalism opportunities that I have had.”
Trahant continues to be inspired by young people carrying “on the legacy of legends like Richard LaCourse or Suzan Harjo.”
“I treasure all the stories that people have shared with me over the years from the deeply personal to those exploring complex policy issues,” he said.
2023 inductees:
- Mark Trahant, Shoshone-Bannock, author, editor, reporter, and former president of the Native American Journalists Association. He was named Best Columnist by the Native American Journalists. He was a co-winner of the Heywood Broun Award and in 2019 Trahant received the NAJA-Medill Milestone Achievement Award. He was co-author of a series on federal Indian policy and a finalist for the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting. Trahant served as chairman and CEO at the Robert C. Maynard Institute for Journalism Education.
- Richard Trudell, Santee Dakota, was the founder and executive director of the American Indian Lawyer Training Program and its American Indian Resources Institute. Trudell has served on governing and advisory boards of numerous organizations, including the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial, the National Board of Directors of the Legal Services Corporation under an appointment by President Jimmy Carter, the Presidio Council of the Golden Gate National Park Service in San Francisco, and the Native American Rights Fund.
- Leslie Marmon Silko, Laguna Pueblo, novelist, poet, and essayist. She was a recipient of the 1994 Native Writers’ Circle of the Americas Lifetime Achievement Award and the 2020 Robert Kirsch Award. Silko garnered early literary acclaim for her short story “The Man to Send Rain Clouds,” which was awarded a National Endowment for the Humanities Discovery grant. The story continues to be included in anthologies.
- Joe DeLaCruz, Quinault Indian Nation, served as tribal president for 22 years. DeLaCruz built a formidable record of accomplishment, tackling such tough and long-standing issues as access to reservation lands by non-Natives, fisheries, and logging management, and perhaps most notably, the status and role of Indian tribes within the American body politics. He was one of the architects of the Centennial Accord, which delineates the principles of government-to-government relationship between the tribes and the state of Washington.
- Will Sampson, Muscogee Creek, actor, artist, and rodeo competitor. Sampson’s most notable roles were as Chief Bromden in “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” and as Taylor the Medicine Man in the horror film “Poltergeist II.” Early in his career, Sampson appeared in the production of “Black Elk Speaks” with the American Indian Theater Company in Oklahoma, where David Carradine and other Native actors appeared in stage productions. Sampson received the Canadian Genie Award in 1980 for “Best Performance by a Foreign Actor” in the film, “Fish Hawk.” Sampson founded the “American Indian Registry for the Performing Arts” for Native actors. He also served on the registry’s Board of Directors.
- LaNada Means War Jack, Shoshone-Bannock, writer, and activist and the first Native American student admitted to the University of California at Berkeley. War Jack was an Alcatraz Occupation co-leader and, with other students throughout California, took over Alcatraz Island in a peaceful protest. While a student, War Jack participated as the Native American component of the Third Worlds Strike to establish the first Ethnic Studies Program in the UC statewide university system. War Jack was on the founding board and executive board of the Native American Rights Fund. She has been an elected council member and served on many boards both locally and nationally.
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