Support by sinofsky chambers law, championing tribal sovereignty and Native American rights since 1976 from opioids litigation to treaty rights to tribal self governance, with offices in Washington, D.C., New Mexico, California, and Alaska. Sinofsky chambers law. Support by AARP, AARP creates and connects people to unique tools and programs helps conserve personal resources and tackles issues that matter most to individuals, families and communities, more at AARP dot org. Your listening to native America calling, I'm Sean spruce. We're continuing our conversation about the occupation of wounded knee and there's still time to join our conversation. So what are you waiting for? Call us. One 809 9 6 two 8 four 8. One 809 9 6 two 8 four 8, especially anyone listening up in pine ridge. We really want to hear what the impact of the occupation was on tribal members. When it occurred in 1973 and what it means today, 50 years later, one 809 9 6 two 8 four 8 give us a call. Let's talk to our third guest now again, Russ daibo. He's up in Canada. Russ tell us more what led you to wounded knee in 1973. Well, for me, I was a teenager then. And I was trying to learn more about Indian rights and I was actually at the takeover of the bureau of Anita Ferris building in November of 1972. Hitchhiked down there after it started. And I met Lakota people there. And I found out about the trail broken treaties that was a caravan that went across the country. I didn't know that. I just saw what was on TV. And I started learning about the broken treaty and what was going on. And of course, the Nixon administration wanted everybody out of there. So they paid for everybody to leave the building. And a few months later, that's when the situation came on the news again. And I remembered meeting the Lakota people in Washington, D.C.. And I didn't go there until March, myself, it was when they kicked the media out, and you started hearing on the newest government sources said today kind of thing. So there was like a blackout, so I hitchhiked out there to find out what was going on to South Dakota and I came in through Gordon, Nebraska. I hitchhiked to there and I was walking north and a car a little bit of Lakota picked me up. And they said, are you going to the knee? And I said, yeah, and it took me to the edge. The reservation and they pointed to this house and it had some outbuildings and he said, good down there. They're going to take you in. Into the knee. So I walked down the hill, went there. And as soon as I got into the yard, somebody came out of the house and said, get in the barn. And I went in the barn and there was all these other people standing around. And they said, we're going to go in when it gets dark. So we all had to take pack loads of supplies. What the previous speaker was talking about, we were part of that local people taking outside people into wounded me. And I had about, I don't know, 80 pounds of supplies that they put into the pack and told me to carry in. So there was at least a dozen of us like that each carrying a pack of supplies in. And so they let us in and we had to it's a hilly country. We had to stay in the valleys and go through at night. Avoiding the U.S. Marshals and their armored personnel carriers and the FBI and horseback and all that stuff. And they got us into wounded knee just before dawn. It was about an 8 mile hike. And we got in there. And once I got in there, then they had people processing people were coming in, finding out who they were and then telling them, giving them assignments, I was a transient, I guess you could say like others that came and went. Because I was inside, I wanted me for a week. But it was a very intense experience war like I guess you could say with firefights, flares and all of that. But they told me to sleep in the church and appeal that white church on the hill. That's where I slept the whole time. I was there. And they told me during the day to go into this one bunker. Just left of that church, not too far from where the main burial site was from the massacre. And after the day was done, then they said I could do what I want after my duty at the bunker. And so I would go down and listen at headquarters there where I'd listen to the radio chatter. Between the frontline bunkers and they also monitored the U.S. Marshals and the FBI chatter on the radio. And then at night Russell Means in Dennis Banks would give an update on the talks with the federal government. And when I was there, there was about two or 300 people and wounded me, I think. And a lot of people were coming and going all the time like myself. And after I figured out what was going on, I learned about the growth and then the groans and us grow the civil rights organization asking him to come in and everything. I had an idea of what they were trying to negotiate. And there was a young Lakota guy after about a week, he was 17 years old too, my same age. He was from porcupine South Dakota about 8 miles north. And he said, I'm going home. Do you want to come out with me? And I said, sure, I'll go with you. So he led me out of wounded me again under the cover of darkness and we made it to his family's home in porcupine. And they hid me there for about a week before they could get me off the reservation to take a bus to go back home? Because they didn't want dick Wilson and his goal is to see me there. So it was kind of a wartime situation to a lot of tense. I could only go out at night because he didn't want any neighbors to see me. And outside for two weeks old together. Two weeks. And then what was it rusted that prompted you to want to leave after two weeks as opposed to staying longer? Well, I went there to try and find out what was going on because like I said, I was at the takeover to be a building. And that's where I started to learn about the treaty of fort Laramie of 1868 and what was going on and I went to wounded knee because there was a media blackout, right? On what was happening. So I went there to try and figure out what the real situation was because I was a teenager, trying to learn more about rights. About these treaties, because I'm a Mohawk, you know, member of the holder in the Shawnee confederate. So we have our own history, our own treaties. But I was just starting to learn then. And I figured that I had a good idea of what the conflict was about. And I was a high school dropout at that time, but that experience being in firefights and that at one point I was out in open field and flare went up and I was walking with Alaska native guy named angel. That's how I knew him by. And he said, hit the ground. And so we were laying on the ground in this open field on our way up to that church. And then a firefight started. And so we were out in the open during that firefight. And you could see the tracer bullets and not coming from near my personnel carriers. And there were other firefights when I was there, but that was the one where I felt most vulnerable because I was out in the open. Anyway, we had to wait for the flares to stop and the firefight and to make it high tail it up to the church. And all those experiences led me to get my finish my high school education and go start going