In 1969, gifted and charismatic Native American activist Richard Oakes led the nonviolent occupation of Alcatraz, an act protesting the U.S. government’s treatment of Indigenous people and reclaiming of Ohlone land. Oakes became the face of the “Red Power” movement, inspiring other protests across the country. In 1972, he was shot and killed in the woods of rural Sonoma County. Through interviews with family members and law enforcement officials and access to hundreds of government documents and FBI files, Jason Fagone and Julie Johnson meticulously tell Oakes’ story, including his early activist years at San Francisco State, the events leading up to this death, and the aftermath of the manslaughter trial of Michael Oliver Morgan, the man who shot him. Fagone and Johnson’s words alone are powerful, but the animation, illustration, and photography in the story’s digital version add an effective visual layer.
Dispatches from a fracturing America spread across the front page of the Chronicle on Nov. 11, 1969. Richard Nixon’s administration railed against anti-war protesters; police in Memphis sprayed tear gas into a crowd of young Black people opposing segregation. But the lead story that day was Alcatraz. “A war party” of 14 “young Indian invaders” had claimed the island, calling themselves the Indians of All Tribes and naming Oakes their “president-elect.”
Celebrities including Jane Fonda and Anthony Quinn soon declared their support, sailing to Alcatraz one day on a boat purchased for the protesters by the band Creedence Clearwater Revival. The occupation was becoming a ’60s event, tugging at politics and pop culture. But another set of visitors went largely unnoticed by the media. In the last weeks of 1969, delegations from tribes across the country journeyed to the island, curious to see what this new nation looked like. Oakes asked these elders for guidance, and they in turn asked for advice on land fights in their own territories.
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