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Impostor
An impostor (also spelled imposter) is a person who pretends to be somebody else, often through means of disguise. Their objective is usually to try to gain financial or social advantages through social engineering, but also often for purposes of espionage or law enforcement. Notable impostors False nationality claims * Princess Caraboo (1791–1864), Englishwoman who pretended to be a princess from a fictional island * Korla Pandit (1921–1998), African-American pianist/organist who pretended to be from India * George Psalmanazar (1679–1763), who claimed to be from Formosa False minority national identity claims * Joseph Boyden (born 1966) Canadian writer who falsely claimed First Nations ancestry * H. G. Carrillo (1960–2020), American writer and assistant professor of English at George Washington University who claimed to be a Cuban immigrant despite having been born in Detroit to American parents. * Asa Earl Carter (1925–1979), who under the alias of supposedly C ...
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Princess Caraboo
Mary Baker (née Willcocks; 11 November 1792 (alleged), Witheridge, Devonshire, England – 24 December 1864, Bristol, England) was an English impostor. Posing as the fictional Princess Caraboo, Baker pretended to come from a far-off island kingdom and fooled a British town for some months. Biography On 3 April 1817, a cobbler in Almondsbury in Gloucestershire, England, met an apparently disoriented young woman wearing exotic clothes who was speaking an incomprehensible language. The cobbler's wife took this stranger to the Overseer of the Poor, who placed her in the hands of the local county magistrate, Samuel Worrall, who lived in Knole Park on the estate where Tower House is located. Worrall and his American-born wife Elizabeth could not understand her either; what they did determine was that she called herself Caraboo and that she was interested in Chinese imagery. They sent her to the local inn, where she identified a drawing of a pineapple with the word 'nanas', meaning ...
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Jamake Highwater
Jamake Highwater (born Jackie Marks, also known as Jay or J Marks; 14 February 1931 – June 3, 2001) was an American writer and journalist of Eastern European Jewish ancestry who mispresented himself as Cherokee. In the late 1960s, Marks assumed a pretendian identity, claiming to be Cherokee, and used the name "Jamake Highwater" for his writings. As Highwater, he wrote and published more than 30 fiction and non-fiction books of music, art, poetry and history. His children's novel ''Anpao: An American Indian Odyssey'' (1973) received a Newbery Honor. His book ''The Primal Mind: Vision and Reality in Indian America'' (1981) was the basis of a PBS film documentary about Native American culture. Marks was exposed as an imposter in 1984 by activist Hank Adams (Assiniboine) and reporter Jack Anderson in separate publications. Despite this, Marks continued to be widely perceived by the general public as Native American. Early life, education and career Jackie Marks was born on 13 ...
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George Psalmanazar
George Psalmanazar ( 1679 – 3 May 1763) was a Frenchman who claimed to be the first native of Formosa (today Taiwan) to visit Europe. For some years he convinced many in Britain, but he was eventually revealed to be of European origins. He subsequently became a theological essayist, and a friend and acquaintance of Samuel Johnson and other noted figures in 18th-century literary London. Early life Although Psalmanazar intentionally obscured many details of his early life, it is believed that he was born in southern France, perhaps in Languedoc or Provence, to Catholic parents, some time between 1679 and 1684.George Psalmanazar: the Celebrated Native of Formosa
by the Special Collections Department of University of Delaware Library. Last modified 3 November 2003. Accessed 3 November 2003 ...
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Iron Eyes Cody
Iron Eyes Cody (born Espera Oscar de Corti, April 3, 1904 – January 4, 1999) was an American actor of Italian descent who portrayed Native Americans in Hollywood films, famously as ''Chief Iron Eyes'' in Bob Hope's '' The Paleface'' (1948). He also played a Native American shedding a tear about litter in one of the country's most well-known television public service announcements from the group Keep America Beautiful. Living in Hollywood, he began to insist, even in his private life, that he was Native American, over time claiming membership in several different tribes. In 1996, Cody's half-sister said that he was of Italian ancestry, but he denied it. After his death, it was revealed that he was of Sicilian parentage, and not Native American at all. Early life Cody was born Espera Oscar de Corti on April 3, 1904, in Kaplan in Vermilion Parish, in southwestern Louisiana, a second son of Francesca Salpietra from Sicily and her husband, Antonio de Corti from southern Italy ...
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Ojibwe
The Ojibwe, Ojibwa, Chippewa, or Saulteaux are an Anishinaabe people in what is currently southern Canada, the northern Midwestern United States, and Northern Plains. According to the U.S. census, in the United States Ojibwe people are one of the largest tribal populations among Native American peoples. In Canada, they are the second-largest First Nations population, surpassed only by the Cree. They are one of the most numerous Indigenous Peoples north of the Rio Grande. The Ojibwe population is approximately 320,000 people, with 170,742 living in the United States , and approximately 160,000 living in Canada. In the United States, there are 77,940 mainline Ojibwe; 76,760 Saulteaux; and 8,770 Mississauga, organized in 125 bands. In Canada, they live from western Quebec to eastern British Columbia. The Ojibwe language is Anishinaabemowin, a branch of the Algonquian language family. They are part of the Council of Three Fires (which also include the Odawa and Potawatomi) ...
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Grey Owl
Archibald Stansfeld Belaney (; September 18, 1888 – April 13, 1938), commonly known as Grey Owl, was a British-born conservationist, fur trapper, and writer who disguised himself as a Native American man. While he achieved fame as a conservationist during his life, after his death, the revelation that he was not Indigenous, along with other autobiographical fabrications, negatively affected his reputation. Belaney rose to prominence as a notable author and lecturer, primarily on environmental issues. In working with the National Parks Branch, Grey Owl became the subject of many films, and was established as the "'caretaker of park animals' at Riding Mountain National Park in Manitoba" in 1931. Together with his numerous articles, books, films and lectures, his views on conservation reached audiences beyond the borders of Canada. His conservation views largely focused on humans' negative impact on nature through their commodification of nature's resources for profits, a ...
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African-American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of enslaved Africans who are from the United States. While some Black immigrants or their children may also come to identify as African-American, the majority of first generation immigrants do not, preferring to identify with their nation of origin. African Americans constitute the second largest racial group in the U.S. after White Americans, as well as the third largest ethnic group after Hispanic and Latino Americans. Most African Americans are descendants of enslaved people within the boundaries of the present United States. On average, African Americans are of West/Central African with some European descent; some also have Native American and other ancestry. According to U.S. Census Bureau data, African immigrants generally do not sel ...
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Spokane, Washington
Spokane ( ) is the largest city and county seat of Spokane County, Washington, United States. It is in eastern Washington, along the Spokane River, adjacent to the Selkirk Mountains, and west of the Rocky Mountain foothills, south of the Canadian border, west of the Washington–Idaho border, and east of Seattle, along I-90. Spokane is the economic and cultural center of the Spokane metropolitan area, the Spokane–Coeur d'Alene combined statistical area, and the Inland Northwest. It is known as the birthplace of Father's Day, and locally by the nickname of "Lilac City". Officially, Spokane goes by the nickname of ''Hooptown USA'', due to Spokane annually hosting Spokane Hoopfest, the world's largest basketball tournament. The city and the wider Inland Northwest area are served by Spokane International Airport, west of Downtown Spokane. According to the 2010 census, Spokane had a population of 208,916, making it the second-largest city in Washington, and the 1 ...
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NAACP
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is a civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E. B. Du Bois, Mary White Ovington, Moorfield Storey and Ida B. Wells. Leaders of the organization included Thurgood Marshall and Roy Wilkins. Its mission in the 21st century is "to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to eliminate race-based discrimination". National NAACP initiatives include political lobbying, publicity efforts and litigation strategies developed by its legal team. The group enlarged its mission in the late 20th century by considering issues such as police misconduct, the status of black foreign refugees and questions of economic development. Its name, retained in accordance with tradition, uses the once common term '' colored people,'' referring to thos ...
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Rachel Dolezal
Nkechi Amare Diallo (; born Rachel Anne Dolezal, November 12, 1977) () is an American former college instructor and activist known for identifying as a transracial black woman. In addition to claiming black ancestry, she also claimed Native American descent. She is also a former National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) chapter president. Dolezal was president of the NAACP chapter in Spokane, Washington, from 2014 until June 2015, when she resigned in the midst of controversy over her racial identity. She was the subject of public scrutiny when her parents publicly stated that she was pretending to be black but was actually white. The statement by Dolezal's parents followed Dolezal's reports to police and local news media that she had been the victim of race-related hate crimes; a police investigation did not find support for her allegations. Dolezal had also claimed on an application form to be mixed-race and had falsely claimed that an African-American ...
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Helen Darville
Helen Dale (born Helen Darville; 1972) is an Australian writer and lawyer. She is best known for writing ''The Hand that Signed the Paper'', a novel about a Ukrainian family who collaborated with the Nazis in The Holocaust, under the pseudonym Helen Demidenko. A daughter of British immigrants, Darville was educated at Redeemer Lutheran College in Rochedale, a suburb of Brisbane. While studying English literature at the University of Queensland, she wrote ''The Hand that Signed the Paper''. In 1993, the novel won The Australian/Vogel Literary Award for an unpublished manuscript. Dale published her book in 1994 and won the Miles Franklin Award, becoming the award's youngest winner. The following year, she was the subject of a major Australian literary controversy because she had falsely claimed Ukrainian ancestry as part of the basis of the book (and her pseudonym). The misrepresentation has been described as a "literary hoax" in ''The Sydney Morning Herald.'' The novel was sub ...
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