Pollux Variste Kjeld

Gladys Tantaquidgeon Pollux Variste Kjeld

Publisher Marketing: Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Gladys Tantaquidgeon (June 15, 1899 - November 1, 2005) was a Mohegan anthropologist, author, council member, and elder. In childhood, she learned traditional practices, beliefs, and lore from nanus or respected elder women. One of her mentors was Mohegan traditionalist Fidelia Fielding, who lived from 1827 to 1908. Tantaquidgeon had only infrequent Western education in youth, but at 18 she attended the University of Pennsylvania to study anthropology. There she studied and worked with Frank Speck. She later did field work concerning the Lenape and other eastern tribes. Later she worked with the "Federal Indian Arts and Crafts Board" and advocated for an end to the ban on the Sun Dance. She also worked at a museum set up by the Tantaquidgeon family. In 1947 she returned to her own people becoming a council member and medicine woman. She was a librarian in the Niantic Women's Prison. She received honorary doctorates from UConn (1987) and Yale (1994). She was named to the Connecticut Women's Hall of Fame. She kept birth, graduation, marriage and death records that proved vital to proving the Mohegan case for federal recognition in 1994.