Description
2020 Choice Outstanding Academic Title
Walks on the Ground is a record of Louis V. Headman’s personal study of the Southern Ponca people spanning seven decades, beginning with the historic notation of the Ponca people’s origins in the East. The last of the true Ponca speakers and storytellers entered Indian Territory in 1877, and most lived into the 1940s.
In Ponca heritage, the history of individuals is told and passed along in songs of tribal members, and so Headman learned through singing with ceremonial singers such as Harry Buffalohead, Ed Littlecook, Oliver Littlecook, Eli Warrior, Dr. Sherman Warrior (son of Sylvester Warrior), Roland No Ear, and “Pee-wee” Clark. Headman’s father, Kenneth Headman, shared most of this history and culture with Louis during winter nights of storytelling. Other elders in the tribe confirmed Kenneth’s stories and insights and contributed to the history Louis Headman has w
