Lame Deer

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This entry is about the Lakota holy man; for the town, see Lame Deer, Montana.

Lame Deer

Lame Deer, (in lakota Tahca Ushte; 1900 or 1903-1976, sources differ), also known as John Fire, John (Fire) Lame Deer and later The Old Man.

Lame Deer was an Oglala-Lakota Sioux born on the Rosebud reservation. He lived with his grandparents until he was 6 or 7, during which he was placed in one of the many boarding schools ran by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs designed to “civilize” the Native Americans after their forced settling on reservations.

His life as a young man was rough and wild; he drank, gambled, womanized, and once went on a several day long car theft and drinking binge. Eventually, he happened upon the house where the original peace pipe given to the Sioux by White Buffalo Calf Woman was kept; much to his surprise, the keeper of the pipe told Lame Deer she had been waiting for him for some time. This served as a turning point in Lame Deer's life, after which he settled down and began his life as a wichasha wakan (“medicine man”, or more accurately, “holy man”). Making his home at the Pine Ridge Reservation and travelling around the country, he became well known both among the Sioux and in the American public at a time when indigenous culture and spirituality were going through a period of rebirth and the psychedelic movement of the 1960s had yet to disintegrate. He often participated in American Indian Movement events, including sit-ins at the Black Hills, land legally belonging to the Sioux that had been taken back by the United States government after the discovery of gold. The Black Hills are considered to be the axis mundi or center of the world by the Sioux Indians; today, Mount Rushmore is one of the Black Hills. Lame Deer's son, Archie Fire Lame Deer, also became a very well respected wachasha wakan; the family tradition continues today through Archie's children.

In 1972, Lame Deer, Seeker of Visions was published, an account of Lame Deer's life and Sioux life as told by Lame Deer to Richard Erdoes, the author of many books on Native Americans, including one written with Archie Fire. Other well known Sioux such as Pete Catches also took part.