1972 "Using racial groups as symbols instead of people is wrong, no matter how favorable you make Aunt Jemima look," Harold Gross.

US Indian ruffling

feathers of sports

by Al Levine 

1972 Feb 15 The Miami News 

      The American Indian is on the warpath in the sports pages.

      He is unhappy as a toothy, large-nosed Cleveland Indian. He regards his identity as a Washington Redskin a racial slur. He finds Chief  Noc-A-Homa of the Atlanta Braves degrading to braves, everywhere.

      Sports has not heard the last of the Mohicans, it seems.

      While several Indian groups go about ruffling feathers on college campuses and threatening lawsuits against professional teams calling themselves Indians of one kind or another, the only smoke generated by the Seminoles of Florida is emanating from a peace pipe.

      The Seminole is proud to be the athletic namesake for teams at Florida State University, said Howard Tommie, Chief of the Florida tribe.

      "Where else throughout the world do you find a team that's got a nickname according to a tribe?" Chief Tommie said yesterday at his reservation in Dania. "I think that's a great honor. And they always have a good showing. I would say we're pretty proud of their nickname."

 $9 million defamation suit

      This opinion is not consistent with the national movement to do away with or reshape the image of the campus and pro sports Indian.

        Spurred on by the American Indian Movement (AIM) and a Sioux named Russell Means, Indian leaders have already filed a $9 million defamation suit against the Cleveland Indians baseball team and their mascot symbol, Chief Wahoo.

      The Braves, who have an Indian dance around a tepee beyond the outfield after every Atlanta home run, are being threatened with a similar suit and the Redskins football team has been requested by an Indian legal counsel to find a new nickname.

      "I wouldn't say AIM's is militant," said Seminole Chief Tommie, "but they go against principles sometimes."

      Indians are carrying their message to college campuses. Eastern Michigan, under pressure, has changed the image of the Huron Indian, the school symbol and nickname, from a "blood-thirsty, whisky-drinking savage" to a "noble and wise chief."

      Indian students at Dartmouth and Stanford have followed with similar protests. Under no apparent pressure, Florida State changed the image of its Seminole this year, from the boyish cartoon to an older, meaner Seminole who carries a tomahawk.

      Last year, the University of Nebraska at Omaha fell to Indian pressure, like Custer. A group of Omaha Indians took their case to a sociology class on campus, which adopted the project and persuaded the student senate to adopt a resolution calling for a new nickname. The school president agreed. It never came to a vote of the student body. 

      Nebraska at Omaha, which played four football games nicknameless last fall, now calls its teams the Mavericks. The change in nickname brought Omaha full cycle.

New breed of Indian

      "We first were the Cardinals," said publicist Fred Gerardi. "But in 1932, St Louis put a minor league baseball team here that was called the Omaha Cardinals. We decided to change our name to escape the confusion. Some Omaha Indians came to the school and suggested that since this area has such a great western history why not call the teams the Indians. We're dealing with a new breed of Indian now." 

      Last fall, the Omahas peeled off the Indian decals from the football helmets, tore the Indian patch off the baseball uniform and ripped the Indians lettering from the basketball shirts. "It costs us about $500,000," said Gerardi. The bookstore sold out its Indian-decorated merchandise as collector's items. 

      The new breed of Indian claims he is among 790,000 American Indians, 40 percent of whom are unemployed. He claims his is the last minority group to be heard from and so it is attacking the simplest form of discrimination.

      Richard LaCourse, a Yakima from the State of Washington and the D.C. correspondent for the American Indian Press Assn., said "For a lot of Indians the name Redskins is highly equivalent to Darkies. It keeps the cheap stereotype of the Indian in circulation." 

      The National Football League Redskins apparently are in for an interesting spring. Three Indian organizations recently opened offices in Washington, joining four others already in business. They have already been heard.

Ad draws their ire

      A Washington department store ran a newspaper ad at the conclusion of the Redskins' season which featured George Allen in Indian head-dress with the caption "Washington has gained pride... even if we lost a little scalp out west." Indian groups demanded an apology from the store, calling the ad " a comment which for Indians can only be a reminder of the days when their scalps were hunted for bounty under governmentally-approved policy."

      Hal Gross, director of the Indian Legal Information Development Service, wrote a three-page letter to Redskins' owner Edward Bennett Williams protesting --

      The team nickname... "a derogatory, racial epithet, no less stereotype-provoking and no less insulting to American Indians than.. New York Kikes, Chicago Pollaks, San Francisco Dagos, Detroit Niggers, Los Angeles Spics, etc."

      The Redskinettes... "a chorus-line of well-meaning but decidedly misguided young ladies in artificial braids who perform at Redskin games and represent a masterpiece of Racial insensitivity performing a cruel mockery of Indian religious dancers."

      And, the Redskin imagery, that "perpetuates stereotypes in which American Indians are seen as participating in scalp-taking, war whooping and expressing themselves in ungrammatical grunts, ughs and other Tontoisms."

      Mr. Gross is still waiting for a reply.

      All of this has not disturbed the serenity of Chief Howard Tommie's reservation in Dania.

      "Russell Means doesn't represent us," Chief Tommie said. "He's only after his own belief. It's an individual Indian that's doing his own thing. I don't agree with his method. He uses illustrations of a Washington team being called the Germans and they come up and beat on the Jews. That's not really constructive reasoning in my mind.

      "What harm does the name Redskins do? It's only a nickname. Nobody's antagonizing the Indians. The only thing Means is doing is getting himself a name. What is he going to do with the nine million? He's not going to distribute it among all the Indians throughout the United States.

      "So what is he proving? He's just going after something for himself and maybe going after a name . I couldn't go along with anybody like that, really." 

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Silly season on Indian names
by Bob Kelly
1972 Feb 17, The Salina Journal 

      The Indians are on the warpath and the attack won't resemble anything the calvary would remember. War paint and feathers have been traded for the well-pressed suits of lawyers.

      The Indians, represented by the American Indian Movement, have gone to court to keep professional, college and high school athletic teams from using some Indians symbols or names.

      The whole controversy started when the AIM filed a suit against the Cleveland Indians, charging the Indians' symbol was 'degrading, demeaning and racist."

      Recently the same group promised to file a suit against the Kansas City Chiefs to stop the pro football team from using an Indian symbol.

      The Chiefs' helmets are decorated with an arrowhead and the KC mascot, Warpaint, is ridden by Bob Johnson, part Sioux. The AIM charges that Johnson's Indian war bonnet is almost sacred. 

      When the AIM announced it would sue the Chiefs, it also indicated other colleges and high schools might be sued.

      Some 7 professional teams use either Indian names or symbols as well as 30 colleges.

Kansas Indians

      The 1971-72 membership director of the Kansas State High School Activities association lists more than 30 schools with some form of Indian name.

      There are 19 teams called the Indians, one nicknamed the Fighting Indians, 3 Chieftains, 3 Warriors, 3 Redskins, 3 Red Devils, a couple of Red Raiders and several more schools that skirt the issue with nicknames of Raiders or Devils.

      If the AIM gets its way, all may have to change their names.

      Several of the schools are located in towns directory connected with Kansas Indian lore - Medicine Lodge, Montezuma, Powhattan, Kiowa and Hiawatha.

      It's ridiculous to say that any school nickname is using the name in a "degrading, demeaning and racist" manner.

Power Image

      Most schools pick nicknames that give their athletic teams an image of power. After all the Indians were once a powerful force on the Kansas plains.

      Haskell Indian Institute, Topeka, may face a unique problem. Will be become merely Haskell Institute? After all the school is for the Indians.

      Could the Pirates, Cowboys or Vikings protest use of their names.

      And just think of how embarrassing it might be if Kansas Wesleyan football coach Gene Bissell was suddenly confronted by an angry pack of Coyotes. The message would be simple - stop using the Coyotes for a nickname or watch our for sharp teeth in your leg. 

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Redskins feud with Indians

Over nickname

1972 March 30. Anderson Daily Bulletin 

      The Washington Redskins came under attack from a group of Indians...

      The delegation, which met with Redskins president Edward Bennett Williams, including LaDonna Harris, wife of Sen. Fred Harris, D-Okla, and president of the Americans for Indian Opportunity, and Leon Cook, president of the National Congress of American Indians.

       "I listened, and that's all," said Williams after the group left his law offices.

      Harold Gross, an attorney for an Indian organization, said the group restated its objections to the term "Redskin" while Williams said he took no official position. The group recommended that a new name for the team be found as soon as possible. 

      "Using racial groups as symbols instead of people is wrong, no matter how favorable you make Aunt Jemima look," Harold Gross.

1972 March 30
Anderson Daily Bulletin 

1972 Feb 15 The Miami News

1972 Feb 17, The Salina Journal 

1972 Jan 20,
The Tampa Tribune