Indians on Alcatraz : First Anniversary

Have you been out here or been involved on the island long? No, I've just been around three months. I've been away. I don't want to say where on this. What do you do? Do you have any idea roughly how many people are actually out here now? Or is that something that you don't want to talk about? I don't actually know. What? You don't actually know. No, because they're never all there at the same time. You know, exactly. Maybe a hundred. What about conditions on the island itself? Like water and so on? Is the government still bringing water on? No, they cut us off. They kill us electricity. It was going to that lighthouse. And they quit ringing in water bars. We bring over five guillain bottles on this boat. They clear water. We take about 25 bottles over it. Fill them up. It appeared. And bring them back over it. But every other day or so. Or when they go empty. That's what we're doing for water now.

Electricity is a couple of generators. They just hooked one up. A big one. It's supposed to supply 30, 150 wide light bulbs. A couple of washing machines. A couple refrigerators. Two televisions. And a couple of radios. That's why I read in the paper anyway. When I was underground papers. I think it was a freedom news. But a week ago. A big article. Thanks. Is there anything either of you would like to say about Alcatraz? Having been heavily involved for some time out here now. Any particular feelings you would like to get out on this first anniversary? Ooh. What would we do? Right on to Alcatraz. We're on the wake of some big shit. Look at that whale. Look at that whale. How about that? They're at a large whale off the starboard box. He comes over here to a four morals support and to keep the population out. Get more to stay over.

We're coming up on the dock now. I heard some people saying they sort of wish that they'd take an angel island instead of Alcatraz island. Either of you have any thoughts on that? I believe they should have taken it if they could, but I believe there's still some kind of installation on it or something under the military. Wouldn't it be feasible for one reason or another? I think they should take over Catalina Island next to his buffalo there. Thanks. Both of you very much. The roar in the background is the sound of the generator. It's next to the living quarters here at Alcatraz. I'm with John Tridel and John has been out here most of the year that the people have been on Alcatraz. John, when did you come to the island? I came out here November 29th. The occupation, the anniversary of the occupation is today. My anniversary being here is still nine days away. Well, you've been here now for almost a year and you've seen a lot of changes on the island and a lot of people come and a lot of people go.

I wonder if we could just talk about that for a few minutes. Specifically about the phases that the island has gone through in terms of the occupation and how it's grown and how it's changed. Can you think back to November 29th, 1969 and when you arrived and what it was like then? Yeah, it's back in November of last year when I first came out here. There was a lot of excitement here, there were a lot of people. The island, the occupation was very new. We had large numbers of people out here living out here anywhere. Two to three hundred people living out here at one time. Then right after that came, the schools were out for semester breaks, quarter breaks, had more people coming out. And at the time we were saying we wanted to deed to the island and money to build a cultural center here. Well, since that time, the only thing we still want to deed to the island, we don't ask for the money anymore. And at that time in the beginning of the year when the occupation first started,

we were more concerned, we were very concerned with how the public would react to what we were doing. We kind of patterned our occupation so as not to offend the public too much because that's where our support was or sympathy. Allow us to stay here. Well, from that time we've kind of evolved through this period now where we're not so much concerned with what middle-class America thinks of us. We're concerned with our image within the Indian people. We're here under the name of Indians of all tribes. And so now what we're working to do is create that good image with our own people. We're not so much concerned with John Q. Public thinks about us anymore because John Q. Public is exactly that. Indian people are our own people. So these are the areas we're working for now. We would like to see a strong sense of Indian nationalism built. And I think Alcatraz has started doing that. Alcatraz started doing that in just by the physical occupation and in the follow-ups by such as Pitt River and the tension that's been put out on the tiles people

trying to get their land back and blue lake. The attention has been put out on the Washington fishing rights. These are different organizations, groups of people standing up to the government. Standing up to the government when we're right. And this is how we're pushing out this Indian nationalism. We're not setting out to create a false sense of patriotism because we can look at this society and see all kinds of stupid things that are in the name of patriotism. So nationalism, pride in the Indian and it's happening. I see the Indian unity coming in. And that's what our whole objective is now, our goal is now is what do we do, do it for Indian people. Because eventually I imagine, I don't know, but I know what the government's solution to this is. You know, that's come and dig us off. And if that happens, we win.

If they give us the deed to the island, we win. So it's pretty good feeling. We win. You know, it's damn good feeling. This is, we don't want the small little battle. We're shooting for the whole works this time. We're shooting for the overall victory. And in the process of doing so, we've, this hasn't changed from the beginning to now. We're not going to tell anyone how we think they should do it. You know, we're not, we're not trying to tell the outside society. Well, this is the way you've got to get the change. We're sending to outside societies, get off our back. Let us make our own change and make, make some of the economics available that are necessary for us to do this. You've expended a lot of your own energy in the last year and doing a lot of traveling around the country and talking to people and so on. Have you seen that kind of unity among Indians of all tribes growing as you, as you go to different places and speak and say what's happening here on Alcatraz? Yes.

I see it coming. Most of my attention has been focused on young people. I mean, it's nothing deliberate that I've planned or anything. It's just been things happening. Most of the speaking who ought to do comes from universities. Therefore, the young people are there. We don't have many Indians. We don't have a large group of Indian people in any one university. I've spoken, and also I've spoken to young Indian groups through state organizations, state Indian organizations, spoken to their young groups and in a case of Oklahoma. But in the Oklahoma, it's been an opportunity organization. I spoke to all levels of Indian reservation, urban, young, middle age, you know, hold. And I see it. I see it very, it's something that I see it through my feelings. You know, I can feel what's there. I can feel the response. Number one is we get out here in the Midwestern other parts of the mainland. And the fact that Indian people are holding Alcatraz

on our own terms, this builds a lot of pride in the people back on the mainland. I talk with the young, and I meet with them, and just talk about what's going on. And they're so eager to absorb it. They want more of it. They want it. And at one time when I was in Oklahoma, I asked all these young kids. I'd say they were just starting high school. I asked them who George Washington was and who Abraham Lincoln and George Armstrong and a strong customer, people like this. And they said, they knew. I mean, you know, they could tell who that was. So then I asked them who Red Lake was or Tecumseh or Manga's Colorado. Joseph. Sitting bull. All right. Of all those names, I asked a thing who Joseph and Sitting Bull were by name. So I gave them a little information, what little information I had on Joseph,

Sitting Bull to Tecumseh, Manga's Colorado. I gave just what I did in essence was I gave crumbs and they took cake. And when they start taking cake from crumbs, you know, it's there, you know. And this has happened in a lot of places that I've traveled to. I haven't been, the Alcatraz hasn't been the only participant sending, you know, what we like to call action groups. You know, we want action. There's organizations in the Midwest like the American Indian Movement on Minneapolis. Most of the places I've been lately, they've had representatives there. And so the young people now are turning two action people and they're saying, tell us what you know or just comments, you know, come and speak, say what you've got to say, we'll listen to it. And in the course of listening, they really hear what we've got to say. And they went to act on it. The university was constant in Madison. The students there are getting a big hassle

by the university. You know, the university does want to kick loose funds, to set up programs because these things take much time and don't have enough money in the budget, you know. So what we've, this is like this is how areas of Indian unity I think will happen. So what we told the students at Madison was, all right, you guys, you get yourselves together. You come up with the Native American Studies program that you want. You've got to do it. You know, you do it within the state of Wisconsin, however you hassle it out. And you come up with the program, you submit it to the school, and they won't buy it, then we'll come back. We'll come back and we'll help you alcatrazil send representatives. American Indian Movement will send them. The drums organization from the Great Lakes area, Detroit, they'll send representatives. This is how the unity comes. What we're working for unity now is like one thing is we don't tell everyone, well, for our own safety and survival, we've all got to hold hands and unite as Indians, because it's not going to work, because then we would have to go for individuality as tribes as individuals, and that whole gig is,

that's the whole system we're bucking right now. You know, we're not trying to get into that. The unity that I see coming is each of us fighting our own battles, our own way, and then kicking in support when one group, when one group organization runs into trouble, the rest of us come in. And that's what we're working for. It's starting to happen. I'm going, we're starting to, the action people also are starting to get out to more and more universities and more and more organizations to speak to the young people, even some areas speak to the old people, but we are not the plague that we would have been two years ago. You know, we're not bad guys anymore, even in a sense of alcatrazil. When alcatrazil started, Indian people were really behind it, but they were individuals that spoke out against it. People hooked in through the BIA. There aren't as many of them doing that anymore as they're a year ago. I mean, even that's a sign. They don't, there aren't very many Indian people that will come out publicly in attack us. Whereas a year ago, some of them would have knocked themselves,

loose getting up to that microphone to say, condemn what we were doing because they were afraid of the BIA. So we're getting there. What is the status as far as you know now of alcatrazil as government and the Indians that are here? Well, the status, we won't deal with the government. It's just as simple as that. We're tired of being lied to and about. Now, the government ever wants to sit down and talk about serious issues, you know, what we want to talk about. And they send someone there with a little authority to deal and maybe we'll sit down and talk. But like the government's stand is going to have to change because when we were negotiating with Robert Robertson, he's the executive director of the National Council or Indian Opportunity out of Vice President Agnew's office. And he was the man we were negotiating with for the deed to the island for the funding, all of this. And so after we dropped the funding requirement, we said, oh, we need is the deed.

And Robertson comes back with, well, this is a national law, you know, and it's illegal. There is no legal way we can turn the deed over to you. And so we've got to live up to the law. So we turn around and we ask him, what about the state of Washington where the Indian people there, they're fishing under treaty. That's law. And the state is coming in and breaking that treaty, you know, destroying these people's equipment, locking them up, harassing them, won't let them fish by the law. These Indians are only trying to live by the law. What about that? How come the government's letting that slip by? And he said, that's not the issue. See, and that is the issue. What's going on in Washington is the issue. What's going on here is the issue. The government taking the blue lake away from the towels people. That's the issue. The government setting prices on land that they admit that they stole, such as the pit river case. That's the issue. The government allowing the BIA to take our young away from us and send them to schools that don't give any education, that only destroy the child. That's the issue. The system saying that our religion isn't any good and only Christianity

is that's going to save us all. They won't allow us to practice our religion in a sense that the other religions are carried on. Our religion isn't recognized by the system. That's the issue. The fact that they're still stealing land that they're breaking hunting and fishing rights. That's the issue. The fact that they're taking our people and drafting them into their armies and they don't have to fight wars that our people got no right being in, that's the issue. See, the issues, when they want to talk about the issues, we'll deal with them again. But the whole thing comes down to here. This is America, and according to the Constitution, it's a democracy and every all-minute created equal and everyone's free. Well, from our understanding and the Indian way of freedom and equality, that means a free equal man has respect from another man or race of people. When you have respect, you have your own dignity, your own self-bearing and your own pride. You control your own life. Well, that's not the case of what's happening here. So if we're going to be free, we'll have to get that freedom on

our own, but we're not not in longer. We're going to allow the system to go around telling everybody that we are free when we're not. You know, it's, and it's not really that hard of a battle because all we have to do is, uh, want the freedom and not be willing to compromise. It's got to get an area here. But when you're right, you don't make deals. Indian people have always been right in dealing with the government, and we've always settled for a compromise and look what's happened to us. So no longer are we going to buy that, uh, we don't know what will happen. We don't really care because things can't get much worse. I'll ask a question, I guess, since it looks like the press conference is trying to get underway over there. What is life on Alcatraz like now? Um, roughly how many people are there here and is living conditions, uh, you know, acceptable and so on? Well, we still have about, uh, we have about 80 people who that's a, you know, the whole numbers change. We've went through during the year from large population

small population. We're back to almost the same number. We started out with the year ago. And out here, like right now, since the government took the water away and shut our power off, we haul our own water. We have, sometimes we have difficulty with heating because like getting firewood is a hassle. So we started turning down the wooden cottages on the island for firewood. Our electrical needs, we've got a generator, 30 kilowatt generator that was bought in for us. It supplies most of our electrical needs. That's all taken care of. So I don't know. I think it's very, I compare it to living on the reservation. You know, it's, uh, we're better often. Some reservations are, even though we don't have a lot of things that were used to it. We're used to living this kind of life. You know, it's, uh, it's not like we came all left, left good homes and came out here and started all of a sudden enduring hardships. These aren't hardships to us. The great deal of our society, it would be with to us. This is the way of life. It's natural. You know, it's, it's just like our culture now.

It's our new culture almost to the extent that this is what we've always lived in. The biggest thing that, that I'm pleased with here is our children. It's the fact that our children are free. Our children, like, see, we have a lot of reporters or people come out here and say, what kind of education are you giving your children? And when they, when they think of education, they only relate to the classroom, you know, they relate to propagandaizing. And what we're trying to relate to out here is real education. We try to see to it that our kids get reading and writing and some arithmetic or whatever that, you know, spelling some of the basics so that they can survive out there if they choose to do so. But the rest of the education is an education of freedom. These kids out here that are living out here, they're never going to forget how the government, or what the government has said or done. These kids will never forget it. They're growing up with it. They're growing up with, we're not pumping political awareness into their heads, but it's there. It's available for them to pick up on if they want to. We don't have to worry about our kids getting

run over by cars and anything like that out here. They take care of each other. They're very independent. My youngest daughter is two and a half years old and she will leave my apartment and she'll come over here to eat child. She does it by herself. She'll get up in the morning, go eat, pick up her plate, walk through the child, and she'll do it at night. The kids, other kids, take care of her. She starts to get into trouble, she'll. The kids have very much freedom here. All the kids that we let them do mainly what they want to because we want them to enjoy. We want them to get this education. They're getting a feeling, a sense of security. Like, I don't know what's going to happen in the future, but for right now, today and for the next week or whatever, as long as we're here, there is no social worker, no BIA person going to tell us that we're on fit for our children and take our children away from us and send them to a school or whatever it is. So they can't do that out here. And this is part of what's what makes our determination hang in there. I mean, you know, it's like we look at the physical,

material, the lack of materialism physically in the lack of luxuries, such as running water and all this, but then we look back at what we've got as people. You know, and it all balances out. I think, as a matter of fact, we're a little better off. Poverty is a state of mind. You know, and yours pours you want to be. It comes down to like, where we're pouring materialism here, I'd say we're rich in spiritualism. The outside society is rich in materialism. They got no spiritualism at all, I don't think. You know, and that's just my opinion of it. But here we're, we've got a feeling of security. We know we expect one of these days a man to come in and try and rip us off. But when he comes, he's got to come and get us all at once, thrust. So we have a sense of security in a very unsecure situation, because as long as we're here, and as long as he doesn't come to bust us, there's nothing going to happen to us out here. You know, we're free.

And that's what the whole thing is all about. I just looked up and saw the light. Is it running these days? What do you call it? A light house? Well, we started running it. That's what policy that has changed. Like when the government shut off the power of the lighthouse, we said, well, we'll run it. And we started running it. Matter of fact, we even sacrificed a generator up there to run that lighthouse when we were doing without down here on our own living. And then when the government said that they were going to turn the power back on to the lighthouse, because the maritime unions and all the fishermen and everybody in the bay area, the harbor area, put pressure on congressmen's sea to get the power restored because of safety and it's a beacon in all these guiding light to everyone. So now we don't care if that light goes on or not, really. If they can do that to get a light turned on, I want to know why they couldn't do that to get our water back to get the power returned to us. They'll do it for themselves, no. If they want to be like that, we'll then help with it. Respect the two-way street all the way down the line. They help us.

We help them. They don't want to help us, then that's up. We don't care about that either, really. But we're finding out what token sympathy is and we're finding out what real tokenism is all the way down the line. It's a very educational place out here. One of these days, I think an appropriate name for this island would be the Isle of Changes, because I've seen a lot of them come. I mean, through the people coming out here, or even seeing the changes that take place and a lot of people's, and they're awareness of capacity. I've seen people, I've seen people come out here that were alcoholics, literally alcoholics, that don't drink anymore. They control it, you know, seeing all that happen. So it's like none of this has been wasted at all. No matter what happens in the future, this hasn't been wasted one bit. It's all been matter of fact, everyone out here deserves an A. Oh, thanks. That's slipping back into that old mold generation. A for a simulation.

Thanks a lot, John. Oh, great spirit. Creator of all things, hear me. Give us strength to overcome the obstacles that have been placed on our trail. Give us the will to withstand the temptations before us by those who would do us ill. Give us the courage to rise above the smallest of men. To set an example for all men to see, to admire, and to follow. With right, we thank the great spirit for the victory we have accomplished, and protecting our people on Alcatraz on it. November 20th, 1969, we came with 89 people to Alcatraz for the purpose of taking the island for all Indian people to have a place we could call Indian land. This tiny island represents freedom for all Indian people living in the Americas, known as Canada, United States, Mexico, and South America.

These are all our great lands of the Indian peoples now held in bondage by alien governments. We have been here one year occupying this island which represents our fight to live as free people in our own country. Our fight for this island representing freedom for all Indian peoples is non-violent. We came to this island unarmed to prepare to give our lives of necessary. We realized that a gun does not make a man and we challenged the entire United States military man to man, man to woman, and man to child with no guns. Even if we had guns on the island, we would be foolish to think we could fight the whole military complex because we are not the masters of weapons violence or murder. We are the true masters of peace. We don't just mouth words when we say that we are the peace people because we speak from our hearts and we are proud to say that we do. Alcatraz is the beginning of the return of the buffalo which means the coming back of our people and the return of the spirit. Alcatraz is a traditional spiritual movement. This is our prophecy and the great spirit is working

for the people. We have won and not just Alcatraz. Our first anniversary celebration marked by the 20th of November, 1970 as a major victory for Indian people everywhere. We have endured the hardships imposed upon us by the federal government on Iraq which has no natural resources. Despite the fact that the government had taken away our freshwater supplies, cut off our electricity, telephone lines, tried to endanger our image through the battle of the press, applied pressure to individuals and families and various other government negotiating tactics. We endured one year and the meeting of season to season completing the circle of our medicine. This is our victory because if the government wants to play a waiting game we can use the time to build instead of watching them watch us test our endurance. Our people have been living like this all the time under the same conditions only now in front of the whole world. We have proved before the whole world into the United States government that our will to survive is greater than all the weapons in the world. No matter how much they have tried to annihilate us,

assimilate us, and the culture aid us we still live. And in the coming year we are going to work and strive in the direction of working with our Indian people and building an awareness as to the political situation and the reasons and why the reasons why things are like they are. Indian people all over the world, all over the America's. We know that we have all been ripped off. We have all been taken off. We have all been taken one way or another. And this is our rallying point. The white man considered us all equal and that one respect he took from all of us. This is our common bondage. We have now something that we have another tool at the white society has given us. Whereas 100 years ago we could not communicate because of language differences. Today we have the English language. We shall use and turn it from a liability into an asset. We shall work to educate our young to inform them

as to the political situation, the social situation, the economic situation that is going on in this country today. But we won't stop. We finished our first year here. Elcatraz can't lose. And we like winnings and will continue to do so. But we will win on our own terms. We will not be drawn in by the United States government. And to using their tactics and fighting this occupation on their terms. This is our protest. We will do it our way and we will win. Because winning is what we are here for. No more losing for us. Thank you. And now Linated means we will be explaining the plans for our cultural center. We have got the architectural plans that lay out here. Linated will take it over here. From the north to the south, the Alaskans to South America, to Mexico, to the United States, from the east to the west. There is one name that has come up among our people

that we all understand and we all know. And this is the Thunderbird. We've been exploited by this name in many ways. Thunderbird wines, Thunderbird hotels. And other names that the white people have exploited our name against us. So it's this island, originally Bird Island. It's only right to call our university here, Thunderbird University. Now what we have here is the model of our island and how we're going to have it. Right here, the only structure, the only call structure will be our totem designed lighthouse. We're continuing to keep the lighthouse going, but it will be redressed in totem design, explaining the story of our people. This represents our totem lighthouse, which is the true statue of liberty,

representing freedom for all Indian peoples everywhere. It represents freedom for worldwide peace as the ships come into the bay and into the harbor. Now as you see here, what we've done, this is our ceremonial lodge right here on the top. We plan to demolish all of the buildings on the island. There's not a one building that we take this fit for our people. And we'll demolish the prison block and set up our ceremonial lodge, our roundhouse on the top. The roundhouse represents our medicine, because the world is round, the sun is round, the seasons of the year evolve in a circle, and this is the base of our medicine. This is unity, and this is for all our people to come. Our houses are done all the same. These are wigwams. There, this will all be done and probably structural glass and steel lined with natural wood

in order to withstand the weather conditions of the area. This has been designed with our aid along with the architects, that we've been using as consultants from Donald McDonald architectural for San Francisco. And all the houses will be the same because we have no class differences. We don't have to fix in our society. We're all here living together for the struggle. We're all giving our lives men, women, and children. This is what we are giving, so we all have the same thing. Considering that the island only has 12 acres, we have used, we put into it everything that we could do with the island, and yet left most of the island open and free. All of these buildings will be destroyed

within the second phase of our years planning. Within the first year of our planning, for the first four months we will finalize the funding angles and within the first four months or less, and within the next eight months we will start the demolition of the island. Now, what we are going to do for the students who are going to be here is going to be people from programs. They're going to be members of programs from ex-cons, alcoholics, drug addicts, ex-service, ex-veterans, who are now in hospitals, who can do things. We're going to establish our, the other half will be of people with no special backgrounds, but we want to relevant education. We want to contribute to this with us. The plan for this, in order to establish our base income,

is very realistic. For years, we've been exploited of our own arts and crafts, the things that we have made and done. Every piece of beadwork is a piece of art. It's something you can't manufacture and put in mass production. Everything that we do is a piece of art. And to establish our economic base, we are going to be on every reservation or Indian community. We'll have people there who are going to buy arts and crafts from our people on the reservation. We have not had anyone to sell their arts and crafts too. Non-Indians have been taking it for little or nothing, and the Indian people have had nothing for themselves. So in order to help all, we've established reservation contact where they will sell the goods to us, and we will be that type of an inlet.

Then we will become an international outlet worldwide for authentic Indian art. And this will establish our base income to run the island and our university. Just to make everyone feel safe, we're working on getting the funding, and we should be getting support on that star. And not to distant future, and we're not asking the Communist Board. So everyone can rest at ease. We're going to do this all legal life. It's going to run into right around $5 million. See, but... Over how long period of time will it take to get this? Within... As long as necessary. You're going to have your negotiating for $5 million in funding now. We're going to go for at least part of it. We're going to give that out yet. We'll tell you when we get word on it. How many people do you envision as actually living here? As students, there will be approximately 300.

Coming and going through this university that will have setups all over. This is part of an entire international education thing. See, there's other areas, you know, like on our reservations, where we're setting up specialties like in areas of law, where arts and crafts, or in cultural centers, and, you know, like we'll be passing through, picking up what we can here, and then on to our reservations or other continental areas, because all of this country, we have not drawn any border lines. And we are still working with our people from the North to Alaska, on down to South America. So John, you mentioned about the funding, how quickly after that, you think the evolution could be in here? Well, it could begin very quickly after that. Because, see, money is like in our dealing with the government, we're holding up to the deed to the island, but we've already claimed ownership of the island. Now, people won't come in to help develop it, because we don't have any money to fail.

Now, we come up with the cash to start developing the island, and I'm sure we'll have some more people on our side to fight the government. You know, it's amazing what a dollar can do. We're right in the wrong way.