Susette La Flesche

Susette La Flesche (1854-1903) was a Native American writer, lecturer, and illustrator. Born to a family of Ponca, Iowa, French, and English ancestry, La Flesche, the daughter of Omaha Chief Joseph La Flesche, was given the name Inshata Themba, or "Bright Eyes." Raised on the Omaha Reservation, she was sent to a girls' school in Elizabeth, New Jersey, where she developed a talent for writing and drawing. She returned to the he home upon graduating to serve as the first American-educated teacher on the Omaha Reservation, where she soon gained a reputation as a political activist and loyal interpreter for Chief Standing Bear. She married abolitionist newspaperman Thomas Tibbles in 1881, and together they toured the country to report on the conditions experienced by Native Americans in a time of genocide and government oppression. She eventually settled on the Omaha Reservation, where she spent the remainder of her life.