Nancy M. Peterson
 The small white building in the background served as poet John Neihardt's study for 11 years.  Nancy autographs books at John Neihardt Day.  The Dr. Susan Picotte Memorial Hospital, built in 1912, served the Omaha people until after World War II. It now houses a museum which profiles its founder, the first Indian woman physician.  A patient's room in the Dr. Susan Picotte hospital.  While in Bancroft, Nancy sought out the grave of Dr. Susan Picotte. Buried with her husband, Henry, her tombstome reads, "Until the Day Dawns"  Susan's sister, Bright Eyes LaFlesche Tibbles, lies nearby, close to her family in the Bancroft Cemebery. Her marker is embellished with a broken bow. It reads, "She did all that she could to make the world happier and better." |
News & NotesThe new Chicken Soup for the Soul: All in the Family contains Nancy Peterson's essay about her late mother-in-law, Helen A. Peterson, who had a quirk that made the family laugh. The section, "In-Laws and Outlaws," relates adventures of two families learning to live with each other. In an article titled, "To Each Her Own," Nancy describes how Helen, who spent her childhood on the Nebraska prairie in a dugout that her family gradually developed into a house, taught her adult children that "there is more than one way to skin a cat," -- or use a dishwasher. The book is widely available at bookstores and on-line.
On Saturday, September 26,2009, Nancy Peterson spoke to the Book Ends book club about her book, Walking in Two Worlds; Mixed-Blood Indian Women Seeking Their Path.
The Mount Rosa Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution asked Nancy Peterson to give a slide lecture titled "Westering Women" on October 5,2009. The meeting took place at the Koebel Public Library. Peterson profiled some of the courageous women who found their destiny along the Platte and Missouri rivers. They included a missionary, a gold-seeker, a homemaker and a Hidatsa Indian girl. Nancy M. Peterson explores the impact of bison on people in the West in the February '09 issue of Wild West magazine. Travelers who explored the West were ever changed by it, and the huge creatures who were awsome enmasse and formmidable as loners challenged their courage and imprinted their memories. None, from trapper Osbourne Russell who fired 26 bullets into a bull that refused to die, to an emigrant womn who crouched helplessly as bison stampeded through her wagon train, to bespectacled tenderfoot Teddy Roosevelt, who endured days of cold, rain and fog to finally make his kill, ever forgot this monster of the plains.
Peterson also writes of the foresight of the few men who prevented the bisons' extinction, and of modern-day ranchers who are raising the animals in nearly every state of the union. Recent efforts of the U.S. Department of Wildlife to preserve and increase the most genetically pure bison bring the story full circle. Nancy was also asked by Wild West to choose the Wid West's Top Ten Rivers west of the Mississippi. Which would you choose? The Missouri? The Platte? The Rio Grande? The Columbia? What about California's American, where gold was discovered? And do you know why Arizona's Gila River and Utah's City Creek found their place on the list? Does Sand Creek's sigificance make up for its lack of size? And how about the Sweetwater, which enabled pioneers to get across barren Wyoming Basin? And wouldn't the Indians choose the Little Bighorn? Check the February 2009 issue of Wild West now on the newstands for Nancy's final choices and see if you agree. The museum and education center is dedicated to the life and work of Neihardt and his small studio is preserved nearby. The John G Niehardt Foundation honors the poet's work each August. This year's program, the 43rd Annual state-legislated celebration, featured Nancy M. Peterson as keynote speaker. She spoke about the Missouri River's early history, which she wrote about in her second book, People of the Troubled Water. She shared experiences of trapper John Colter and Mormon immigrant Jane Richards. She also discussed the Omaha tribe's connection with the white man, Niehardt's friendship with the Joseph LaFlesche family, and the lives of Susette Laflesche Tibbles and Sussn LaFlesche Picotte. The women are profiled in her book, Walking in Two Worlds: Mixed-Blood Indian Women Seeking Their Path. Also in the 2008 program for John Neihardt Day, was author Tim Anderson, who is working on an authorized biography of Neihardt,and Native American Flutist Garan Coons. Anderson focused on Neihardt's book The River and I , about Neihardt's 1908 trip down the Missouri. Coons performed on the flute and also played a hand drum so the audience could participate in a friendhip round dance. Ron Hull of Nebraska Educational Television was master of ceremonies. The Nebraska Humanitites Council co-sponsored the program. Sometimes Nancy Peterson, taking a lighter tone, explores her own history. The just-released Chicken Soup for the Empty Nesters Soul contans her essay "Stepping Out." It describes how she and her husband managed to avoid strangling each other while learning the "ladies underarm turn," and went on to conquer the "Tush Push" and follow the "Tea Cup Chain" to a whole new life without kids at home. Available now in local bookstores.
Half-blood Linda Gruno, whose father was Creek and mother Irish, writes to the author, "I understand how hard it is to be part of two cultures. Unfortunately, one is never quite fully embraced by either one. For my Indian relatives, I am too white. For my white relatives, I am not white enough. For myself, I am just right." She adds, "I wish this book had been available to me when I was growing up. It would have helped me greatly."  The Western Writers of America's anthology The Way West, contains Nancy M. Peterson's story of Indian writer Zitkala-Sa's involvement in The Sun Dance opera.
It is listed in Google Book Search. |
|
