Wilma Mankiller Informative Speech

Wilma Pearl Mankiller began her journey on this Earth on November 18, 1945 in Tahlequah, Oklahoma. She would go on to become the first female deputy chief of the Cherokee Nation in 1983 and the first female principal chief in 1987, until her retirement in 1995. In a speech she gave at Sweet Briar College on April 2, 1993 she sufficiently summed up the magnitude of being the first female chief of the second-largest tribe in the United States when she concluded by saying “Finally, I guess I'd like to say I hope my being here and spending a little time with you will help to erase any stereotypes you might have had about what a Chief looks like.” More than a political figure, Wilma Mankiller was a wife to Hugo Olaya from the time she was eighteen

She was born the sixth of eleven children to Charley and Irene Mankiller, who were Cherokee and Dutch-English, respectively (Janda, “Beloved Women” 80). When she was eleven years old her family moved to San Francisco voluntarily, but still as part of the federal government relocation program (Janda, “Beloved Women” 81). Mankiller found a place of solace from the cruelty of other children towards her for her clothes, name, accent, etc. and other forms of culture shock in the San Francisco Indian Center (Edmunds 211). At the center she met a man by the name of Richard Oakes, who would, eventually, become a great influence in her activism (Janda, “The Intersection” 104). Her time at the center helped her maintain a strong bond with her heritage in the unfamiliar urban

Wilma didn’t live on Alcatraz, but did support the movement fully and worked indirectly to assist—even voting for the first time (Janda, “The Intersection” 106). This, along with volunteer work at the Pit River Tribe, sparked the everlasting interest in activism for Wilma. Pit River was in the midst of trying to regain their land from the Pacific Gas and Electric Company and through her volunteerism with the tribe Wilma learned about treaty rights and sovereignty issues, along with developing research skills while aiding the Pit River Legal Defense (Janda, “Beloved Women” 85-86). Her love for activism spurred a divorce between her and her first husband in 1974 because her budding feminism was redefining her thought process and she was no longer satisfied being a housewife (Janda, “The Intersection” 109). In her autobiography, Mankiller: A Chief and Her People, she said, “I wanted to set my own limits and control my destiny.” in regards to her divorce.

After her divorce, she moved back to Oklahoma and began working with the Cherokee Nation first as an economic stimulus coordinator, then within the central planning department, then oversaw the Bell Community Revitalization Project to build and remodel homes as well as