He stayed for more than two decades, moving back to Arkansas when he retired in 1972.īrown had been writing on the side since the 1930s, beginning with magazine stories.

He was drafted into the Army in 1942 and spent most of World War II assigned to library work at the Army’s Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland.Īfter the war, Brown headed the agricultural library at the University of Illinois, where he earned a master’s degree in library science and became a professor. Within a few years, he became head librarian at a government library in Beltsville, Md. Department of Agriculture library in Washington, D.C., in 1934. A job in the college library helped offset his tuition costs.ĭuring the Depression he worked, by his estimate, 50 different jobs before he landed an entry-level position at the U.S. He later enrolled at Arkansas State Teachers College as a history major. Brown started to read anything he could find about Native American tribes and wondered why they were so often portrayed as villains.Īfter attending Little Rock High School, Brown worked as a printer and reporter for the Harrison, Ark., Times. “My buddy said to me, ‘You know, those aren’t real Indians,’ ” referring to the characters on the screen. In a darkened theater, where he would often join his friends to see western movies, he had what he called his “first real revelation” about their history. Many of Brown’s childhood friends were Native Americans, whose parents worked on oil rigs in the area. His maternal grandmother, who cared for him while his mother worked as a store clerk, regaled him with tales of the Civil War and of her father’s friend, Davy Crockett, the legendary frontiersman. He moved from his birthplace of Alberta, La., to Ouachita County, Ark., after the death of his father when he was 5. “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee” was the culmination of a lifelong fascination with Western history that began when Brown was a boy growing up in Arkansas.

He also wrote a dozen novels, among the most notable of which is “Creek Mary’s Blood” (1980), a generational tale of an Indian family’s westward journey. Dee Brown them the direct object.”īrown wrote mostly nonfiction, covering such topics as the building of the railroads and women settlers of the Old West. They were always an important part of the American West, usually as the indirect object. “The effect of ‘Bury My Heart’ was essentially to give voice to the American Indians.

Left my heart at wounded knee