X BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 195] 



SOUTHERN PONCA INFORMANTS 



Mrs. Virginia Headman (VHM), nee Big-soldier, was the only 

 Southern Ponca informant interviewed who was old enough at the 

 time of the Ponca Eemoval to remember much of the old tribal life 

 in Nebraska and South Dakota. She was 15 years old when the 

 Ponca were brought to Baxter Springs, Kans., in 1877. Although 

 hardly able to move about in 1954, her mind remained clear and her 

 sense of humor keen. She was able to describe the tribal hunts along 

 the Elkhorii and Keya Paha Rivers, and she vividly recalled a visit 

 paid to a Pawnee earth-lodge village on the Platte when she was very 

 small. 



Leslie Red-leaf (LRL) was the last remaining chief (of the second 

 rank) among the Southern Ponca. Blind and feeble, he still retained, 

 m 1954, a clear memory of the old ways, and walked with the proud 

 carriage of an oldtime Ponca chief. Dressed in his otterskin cap and 

 red and blue broadcloth blanket he presented an imposing figure at 

 various powwows in the Ponca City area. He was approximately 

 89 years old at the time of his death in 1955. 



Louis MacDonald (LMD) was 2 years old when the Ponca tribe 

 was moved south. As a boy he listened carefully to the words of the 

 old men. A Carlisle graduate, he spent much of his life working for 

 his tribe in Washington. He was, in 1954, one of the two remaining 

 "soldiers" or Buffalo-police among the Southern Ponca. He was 

 also prominent in Peyote affairs and was an informant on this sub- 

 ject for La Barre (1938, p. 3) . He was 83 years of age at the time of 

 his death in 1958. 



Obie Yellow-bull, or Little-standing-buffalo (OYB), is particularly 

 well versed in tribal mythology and custom. In 1954 he was still able 

 to make and play the Indian flute, and was the last member of his 

 tribe to do so (pi. 24, c). At present (1962) he is 79 years old, both 

 blind and deaf. Though OYB was a willing informant, he often spoke 

 so rapidly that it was not possible to secure a complete running trans- 

 lation of his remarks from PLC, who served as my interpreter. 



Albert Makes-cry (AMC) was a particularly valuable informant 

 because he was able to relate the tales he had heard from older South- 

 ern Ponca to landmarks in Nebraska and South Dakota, where he had 

 visited for long periods as a boy. A deeply religious man, "Uncle 

 Albert" is often called upon to lead the singing at church services 

 and to pray for the group at tribal gatherings. He is 70 years old. 



Walter Blue-back (WBB) or Black-eagle (his Sun dance name) 

 was the Xuhe of the short biographical sketch of that title by Whit- 

 man (1939). WBB was the only Ponca youth of his generation to 

 take part in the Sun dance and other old Ponca rituals. At one time 

 he was a practicing Bear shaman. He later abandoned the practice 

 in favor of the Peyote religion, in which he became a leader. Though 



