of the fish wars. September 9, 1970. Image- Hank Adams Personal Collection
Chapter Eight of “Where the Salmon Run” written by Trova Heffernan and sponsored by Washington Secretary of State Sam Reed.
Like the regal bald eagle that soars above the trees and a distressing past that nearly left it extinct, Billy Frank and fellow Indians at the Landing see themselves as survivors, indefatigable soldiers of sovereignty. They are extensions of each other who used to trade personal effects, such as necklaces, when they traveled.
“They really have a collective knowledge, a collective wisdom, a collective history and they have expanded each other beyond human size,” says Suzan Harjo, a congressional liaison of Indian Affairs appointed by Jimmy Carter. “It’s that kind of spirit that has made non-Indians fear us and some still do. That’s what they mean by tribalism. . . . What they don’t understand is that the power comes from uniting over the good and to have this day and this life. It’s generational and it’s timeless.” The Frank’s Landing family united with tribes across the country in a sweeping movement. Its catalyst was the much publicized takeover of Alcatraz. For their ancestors who, a century before, brokered treaties with the United States and surrendered their homeland, Native Americans climbed into boats on San Francisco Bay in November 1969. They hauled water up jagged cliffs of Alcatraz Island armed with twenty-four dollars’ worth of glass beads, a “precedent set by the white man’s purchase of [Manhattan] Island about 300 years ago,” note activists in the proclamation, “To the Great White Father and All His People.” An 1868 treaty with the Sioux Nation gave Indians “exclusive reversionary title” to any unclaimed federal property, the new occupiers said. Alcatraz may have once locked up the likes of gangster Al Capone, but soon after it deteriorated in salty air and shut down, Indians from thirty tribes mobilized. They united on Alcatraz as they came together on Washington riverbanks. What they wanted was recognition of their treaty rights and a way of life. They wanted an end to poverty and a chance to preserve their heritage. When they took over Alcatraz, every American with a newspaper read the news.
“We’re taking back Indian land,” organizer Dean Chavers told Willie, Billy’s father, on the eve of the takeover.
“Good for you!” Willie replied from Frank’s Landing, informing Chavers that supporters were headed to San Francisco Bay and “the rock.” The occupation of Alcatraz, which lasted nearly nineteen months, is considered a turning point, triggering a wave of seventyfour takeovers across the country that helped shift public policy toward Native Americans.
Uprisings continued in the Pacific Northwest. Billy’s son Sugar had just turned nine when they arrested him at Fort Lawton, a decommissioned military base on the west end of Seattle. “He was only about that big,” Billy says laughing and extending his arm. “We were all there, my boys and everybody.” The plan to take Fort Lawton came in the midst of pending legislation that approved a no-cost transfer of the post to local government for parks and recreational use. Bernie Whitebear, a Colville Indian, led the effort to reclaim the installation as Indian land.
On a wind-whipped day in March 1970, Whitebear confronted Henry “Scoop” Jackson, a longtime and popular U.S. senator from Washington State:
“We believe the time has now arrived for the Indian to use his own initiative, take charge of his own destiny and at the same time make a contribution to greater society,” Whitebear told the senator. “You will have to go through the Department of the Interior. . . . I can only emphasize the need to follow the law on that because otherwise you wouldn’t be eligible,” Jackson warned. Early in his career, Jackson pushed for the termination of Indian tribes. He later changed his mind and authored key legislation to promote Indian self-determination.
