Lame Deer, (in
LakotaLakota is a Siouan language spoken by the Lakota people of the Sioux tribes. While generally taught and considered by speakers as a separate language, Lakota is mutually understandable with the other two languages , and is considered by most linguists one of the three major varieties of the Sioux...
Tȟáȟča Hušté; 1900 or 1903-1976, sources differ), also known as
John Fire,
John (Fire) Lame Deer and later
The Old Man, was a Lakota holy man. He belonged to the
HeyokaThe word Heyókȟa refers to the Lakota concept of a contrarian, jester, satirist or sacred clown.Heyókȟa are thought of as being backwards-forwards, upside-down, or contrary in nature. This spirit is often manifest by doing things backwards or unconventionally -- riding a horse backwards, wearing...
society.
Lame Deer was a Mineconju-Lakota
SiouxSioux are a Native American and First Nations people. The term can refer to any ethnic group within the Great Sioux Nation or any of the nation's many dialects...
born on the
Rosebud Indian ReservationThe Rosebud Indian Reservation is an Indian reservation in South Dakota, United States. It is the home of the Sicangu Oyate, also known as Sicangu Lakota, the Upper Brulé Sioux Nation, and the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, a branch of the Lakota people...
. His father was Silas Fire Let-Them-Have-Enough. His mother was Sally Red Blanket. He lived and learned with his grandparents until he was 6 or 7, after which he was placed in a day school near the family until age fourteen.
Lame Deer, (in
LakotaLakota is a Siouan language spoken by the Lakota people of the Sioux tribes. While generally taught and considered by speakers as a separate language, Lakota is mutually understandable with the other two languages , and is considered by most linguists one of the three major varieties of the Sioux...
Tȟáȟča Hušté; 1900 or 1903-1976, sources differ), also known as
John Fire,
John (Fire) Lame Deer and later
The Old Man, was a Lakota holy man. He belonged to the
HeyokaThe word Heyókȟa refers to the Lakota concept of a contrarian, jester, satirist or sacred clown.Heyókȟa are thought of as being backwards-forwards, upside-down, or contrary in nature. This spirit is often manifest by doing things backwards or unconventionally -- riding a horse backwards, wearing...
society.
Lame Deer was a Mineconju-Lakota
SiouxSioux are a Native American and First Nations people. The term can refer to any ethnic group within the Great Sioux Nation or any of the nation's many dialects...
born on the
Rosebud Indian ReservationThe Rosebud Indian Reservation is an Indian reservation in South Dakota, United States. It is the home of the Sicangu Oyate, also known as Sicangu Lakota, the Upper Brulé Sioux Nation, and the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, a branch of the Lakota people...
. His father was Silas Fire Let-Them-Have-Enough. His mother was Sally Red Blanket. He lived and learned with his grandparents until he was 6 or 7, after which he was placed in a day school near the family until age fourteen. He was then sent to a
boarding schoolA boarding school is a school where some or all pupils not only study, but also live during term time, with their fellow students and possibly teachers. The word 'boarding' is used in the sense of "bed and board", that is, food and lodging...
, one of many run by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs for Indian youth. These schools were designed to “civilize” the
Native AmericansNative Americans in the United States is the phrase that describes indigenous peoples from North America now encompassed by the continental United States, including parts of Alaska and the island state of Hawaii. They comprise a large number of distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of...
after their forced settling on reservations.
Lame Deer's life as a young man was rough and wild; he traveled and rode the
rodeoRodeo is a sport which arose out of the working practices of cattle herding in Spain, Mexico, and later the United States, Canada, South America and Australia. It was based on the skills required of the working vaqueros and later, cowboys, in what today is the western United States, western...
circuit as a rider and later as a
rodeo clownA bullfighter or rodeo clown, also known as a rodeo protection athlete, is a rodeo performer who works in bull riding competitions. The primary job of the bullfighter is to protect a fallen rider from the bull, whether the rider has been bucked off or has jumped off of the animal...
. According to his personal account, he drank, gambled, womanized, and once went on a several day long car theft and drinking binge. Eventually, he happened upon the house where the original peace pipe given to the Lakota by
White Buffalo Calf WomanWhite Buffalo Calf Woman , a sacred woman of supernatural origin, is treated as a prophet or a messiah and is central to the Lakota religion. Oral traditions relate that she brought the extended Lakota nation of the Teton Sioux their "Seven Sacred Rituals".- Story :The traditional story is that,...
was kept; much to his surprise, the keeper of the pipe told Lame Deer she had been waiting for him for some time. This served as a turning point in Lame Deer's life. He settled down and began his life as a
wichasha wakan (“
medicine man"Medicine man" or "Medicine woman" are English terms used to describe Native American healers and spiritual figures. Anthropologists tend to prefer the term "shaman."- Role in native society :...
”, or more accurately, “holy man”).
Making his home at the Pine Ridge Reservation and travelling around the country, Lame Deer became known both among the Lakota and to the American public at a time when indigenous culture and spirituality were going through a period of rebirth and the
psychedelicThe term psychedelic is derived from the Greek words ψυχή and δηλείν , translating to "mind-manifesting". A psychedelic experience is characterized by the perception of aspects of one's mind previously unknown, or by the creative exuberance of the mind liberated from its ostensibly ordinary fetters...
movement of the 1960s had yet to disintegrate. He often participated in
American Indian MovementThe American Indian Movement is a Native American activist organization in the United States. AIM gained international press when it seized of the Bureau of Indian Affairs headquarters in Washington, D.C., in 1972, and in 1973 had a standoff at Wounded Knee, South Dakota, on the Pine Ridge Indian...
events, including
sit-inA sit-in or sit-down is a form of direct action that involves one or more persons nonviolently occupying an area for a protest, often to promote political, social, or economic change.-Process:...
s at the
Black HillsThe Black Hills are a small, isolated mountain range rising from the Great Plains of North America in western South Dakota and extending into Wyoming, USA. Set off from the main body of the Rocky Mountains, the region is something of a geological anomaly—accurately described as an "island of trees...
, land legally belonging to the Lakota that had been taken back by the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
government after the discovery of
goldGold is a chemical element with the symbol Au and an atomic number of 79. It has been a highly sought-after precious metal for coinage, jewelry, and other arts since the beginning of recorded history. The metal occurs as nuggets or grains in rocks, in veins and in alluvial deposits. Gold is...
. The Black Hills are considered to be the
axis mundiThe axis mundi is a ubiquitous symbol that crosses human cultures. The image expresses a point of connection between sky and earth where the four compass directions meet. At this point travel and correspondence is made between higher and lower realms...
or center of the world by the Lakota Indians.
Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions
Lame Deer related an account of his life and Sioux life and culture to Richard Erdoes, the author of many books on Native Americans. Other well known Sioux such as Pete Catches also took part in this account. In 1972, a book drawn from this account,
Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions, was published.
Erdoes's recorded interviews with Lame Deer, conducted as research for "Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions," are part of the Richard Erdoes Papers at the
Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript LibraryYale University's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library was a 1963 gift of the Beinecke family. The building, designed by architect Gordon Bunshaft, of the firm of Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill, is the largest building in the world reserved exclusively for the preservation of rare books and...
,
Yale UniversityYale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut, and a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States. Yale has produced many notable alumni, including five...
.
Lame Deer was a Heyokah only for a short time, according to his own words in the book, "Lame Deer - Seeker of Visions."