Fantastic piece. In the wake of the unanimous approval of a new hyper-scale data center in a nearby Utah Valley - advocated for and pushed through with obvious dishonesty - your piece illustrates clearly that the county commissioners, the machinery, the craven pursuit of profit, and all that's unfolding around it are just another chapter in the same story.
Rebecca, thank you for this. I don't know the specifics of what happened in that Utah Valley, but I don't need to,I can hear it in how you described it. 'Advocated for and pushed through with obvious dishonesty.' That sentence has the weight of someone who was in the room, or close enough to smell it.
That's the part that never changes. The details change. The valley changes. The thing being extracted changes. The machinery doesn't.
I was in the room along with nearly 800 residents protesting this project. We're now picking up pieces to find whatever points of friction we can to slow down their 40,000 acre 16 GW project. Your piece hit the bullseye. And what isn't leaving me is this notion of somehow staying "unprocessed." So many layers to that thought!
This is great, Tom. I appreciate your approach to this piece—the narrative voice, the structural rigor, the refusal to let readers off the hook with historical distance. It makes me think of three of my favorite examples of Aboriginal American literature: Black Elk Speaks, Seven Arrows, and Touch the Earth (which in addition to the deeply moving Edward Curtis photographs contains many quotations from the original stewards of this continent).
What strikes me about your piece is how it addresses (nd potentially resolves) the fundamental problem that compromised all three of those works: the mediation crisis. Black Elk Speaks filtered Black Elk's Lakota through his son Ben's translation, through Neihardt's daughter's stenography, and most of all through poet John Neihardt's literary shaping. Even Chief Seattle's 1854 speech traveled through Chinook pidgin, through Dr. Henry Smith's memory over 33 years, through Smith's own poetic style. I think it tells us more about 1880s white literary conventions than Duwamish oratory. But the principal idea remains: You can kill us, but there is no death. Only a change of worlds. We will still be here." I am going to be in Seattle tomorrow, and I always remember his words.
I read Seven Arrows when I was twenty and remember how it ignited immediate controversy when Cheyenne leaders accused Storm of misrepresenting sacred practices, turning the book into a flashpoint about who has authority to speak. Touch the Earth, compiled by T.C. McLuhan in 1971, attempted to solve this by presenting direct Native speeches and writings alongside Curtis's photographs. But Curtis himself was staging scenes, mixing tribal artifacts, creating what he called portraits of "a vanishing race"—his romanticized vision rather than documentary reality. So even the visual "authenticity" was constructed.
The Crazy Horse piece cuts through this entire problematic by making the narrator conscious of the machinery itself. Where those three works were mediated for Native voices by well-intentioned whites, your piece is narrated by a Native voice that understands and exposes the mediation process. When your Crazy Horse explicitly discusses Frank Grouard's mistranslation ("One word. One people changed to another. The Nez Perce becoming the whites"), when he analyzes the filing systems, when he says "You have seen Frank Grouard. You will see him again"—the mediator becomes the subject of critique rather than the invisible translator. By giving Crazy Horse knowledge of MLK's 1966 disapproval ratings, 2004 black sites, 2025 deportation flights, you show these patterns haven't changed.
The piece's most devastating move is its refusal of comfort, in my opinion the same refusal that makes Touch the Earth so powerful. Curtis's photographs are usually consumed as gift store artifacts of a vanishing race, but you explicitly reject that consumption with "The system that killed me is now charging admission to remember me fondly". The thirty-dollar mountain carving. The gift shop. The conversion of threat into brand. And don't forget the giant pile of we see below the desecrated sacred Lakota mountain where four giant white faces stare out at the beautiful planet Americans have exploited, trashed, and left in ruins.
Best thing I’ve read on Native American history, what’s happening now in the news and what I witness among those I know personally. What an eye opener. Hope it spreads wider and wider.
WOW. Tom, thank you for this powerful eye opening piece. It moved me like a extraordinary symphony. What a gift you are to all who read your brilliance.
I will be in the Rapid City area soon - renewing my driver's license. I had wanted to see the Crazy Horse Memorial but I think time spent in Pine Ridge will be better.
Your writing, as always, speaks directly to my heart. Thank you,.
Interesting fact: On this day 5/8 in 1973, members of the American Indian Movement and the Oglala Lakota tribe, who had occupied the South Dakota hamlet of Wounded Knee for 10 weeks, surrendered to federal authorities.
We are all Native now. I read your sensitive essay with gratitude and a sense of universal peace. Peaceful in the realization that truth cannot be lost. Or killed. Or silenced. I smile, hope and thank you for your wisdom.
Fantastic piece. In the wake of the unanimous approval of a new hyper-scale data center in a nearby Utah Valley - advocated for and pushed through with obvious dishonesty - your piece illustrates clearly that the county commissioners, the machinery, the craven pursuit of profit, and all that's unfolding around it are just another chapter in the same story.
Rebecca, thank you for this. I don't know the specifics of what happened in that Utah Valley, but I don't need to,I can hear it in how you described it. 'Advocated for and pushed through with obvious dishonesty.' That sentence has the weight of someone who was in the room, or close enough to smell it.
That's the part that never changes. The details change. The valley changes. The thing being extracted changes. The machinery doesn't.
I'm glad the piece found you when it did.
I was in the room along with nearly 800 residents protesting this project. We're now picking up pieces to find whatever points of friction we can to slow down their 40,000 acre 16 GW project. Your piece hit the bullseye. And what isn't leaving me is this notion of somehow staying "unprocessed." So many layers to that thought!
If you're curious, here's what I wrote before the meeting: https://rebeccamcfaul.substack.com/p/before-the-servers-come?r=e5o40&utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web
Thank you I will read that!!
That is superb, Tom. And right now, it resonates. It really resonates. Thank you.
Thanks for reading Steve!!
You did the honor, a beautiful smoldering meditation, just right.
Thank you Red!!
This is great, Tom. I appreciate your approach to this piece—the narrative voice, the structural rigor, the refusal to let readers off the hook with historical distance. It makes me think of three of my favorite examples of Aboriginal American literature: Black Elk Speaks, Seven Arrows, and Touch the Earth (which in addition to the deeply moving Edward Curtis photographs contains many quotations from the original stewards of this continent).
What strikes me about your piece is how it addresses (nd potentially resolves) the fundamental problem that compromised all three of those works: the mediation crisis. Black Elk Speaks filtered Black Elk's Lakota through his son Ben's translation, through Neihardt's daughter's stenography, and most of all through poet John Neihardt's literary shaping. Even Chief Seattle's 1854 speech traveled through Chinook pidgin, through Dr. Henry Smith's memory over 33 years, through Smith's own poetic style. I think it tells us more about 1880s white literary conventions than Duwamish oratory. But the principal idea remains: You can kill us, but there is no death. Only a change of worlds. We will still be here." I am going to be in Seattle tomorrow, and I always remember his words.
I read Seven Arrows when I was twenty and remember how it ignited immediate controversy when Cheyenne leaders accused Storm of misrepresenting sacred practices, turning the book into a flashpoint about who has authority to speak. Touch the Earth, compiled by T.C. McLuhan in 1971, attempted to solve this by presenting direct Native speeches and writings alongside Curtis's photographs. But Curtis himself was staging scenes, mixing tribal artifacts, creating what he called portraits of "a vanishing race"—his romanticized vision rather than documentary reality. So even the visual "authenticity" was constructed.
The Crazy Horse piece cuts through this entire problematic by making the narrator conscious of the machinery itself. Where those three works were mediated for Native voices by well-intentioned whites, your piece is narrated by a Native voice that understands and exposes the mediation process. When your Crazy Horse explicitly discusses Frank Grouard's mistranslation ("One word. One people changed to another. The Nez Perce becoming the whites"), when he analyzes the filing systems, when he says "You have seen Frank Grouard. You will see him again"—the mediator becomes the subject of critique rather than the invisible translator. By giving Crazy Horse knowledge of MLK's 1966 disapproval ratings, 2004 black sites, 2025 deportation flights, you show these patterns haven't changed.
The piece's most devastating move is its refusal of comfort, in my opinion the same refusal that makes Touch the Earth so powerful. Curtis's photographs are usually consumed as gift store artifacts of a vanishing race, but you explicitly reject that consumption with "The system that killed me is now charging admission to remember me fondly". The thirty-dollar mountain carving. The gift shop. The conversion of threat into brand. And don't forget the giant pile of we see below the desecrated sacred Lakota mountain where four giant white faces stare out at the beautiful planet Americans have exploited, trashed, and left in ruins.
Strong stuff. Keep at it.
I will be proud to say that I knew you before you won any prizes. And you will. I just hope I am alive to enjoy it. And I hope you are too.
Thank you so much!!
Best thing I’ve read on Native American history, what’s happening now in the news and what I witness among those I know personally. What an eye opener. Hope it spreads wider and wider.
Thank you for reading!!
Heart-rending; and nothing ever changes. Only the times, places, and names vary.
Heartbreaking.
WOW. Tom, thank you for this powerful eye opening piece. It moved me like a extraordinary symphony. What a gift you are to all who read your brilliance.
Thank you so much!!
Absolutely amazingly good work.
Thank you!!
Thank you Tom.
I will be in the Rapid City area soon - renewing my driver's license. I had wanted to see the Crazy Horse Memorial but I think time spent in Pine Ridge will be better.
Your writing, as always, speaks directly to my heart. Thank you,.
Thank you for reading and your support!!
Taŋyéȟčiŋ !!!!
Interesting fact: On this day 5/8 in 1973, members of the American Indian Movement and the Oglala Lakota tribe, who had occupied the South Dakota hamlet of Wounded Knee for 10 weeks, surrendered to federal authorities.
Fantastic piece-and I am pretty sure I know why you have told us.
Incredibly crafted work.
Thank you!!
We are all Native now. I read your sensitive essay with gratitude and a sense of universal peace. Peaceful in the realization that truth cannot be lost. Or killed. Or silenced. I smile, hope and thank you for your wisdom.