Helen Hornbeck Tanner (1916–2011) was an American advocate of

Native American rights Native American civil rights are the civil rights of Native Americans in the United States, Native Americans in the United States. Native Americans are citizens of their respective federally recognized tribes, Native nations as well as the Cit ...

and a historian. She argued for Native Americans in court cases, and she documented the tribes of the Great Lakes in 1987. Tanner was inducted into the Michigan Women's Hall of Fame in 2006.

Personal life and education

Tanner was born on July 5, 1916, in Northfield, Minnesota. She spent most of her childhood in

Kalamazoo, Michigan Kalamazoo ( ) is a city in the southwest region of the U.S. state of Michigan. It is the county seat of Kalamazoo County. At the 2010 census, Kalamazoo had a population of 74,262. Kalamazoo is the major city of the Kalamazoo-Portage Metropolit ...

. She graduated from

Swarthmore College Swarthmore College ( , ) is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania. Founded in 1864, with its first classes held in 1869, Swarthmore is one of the earliest coeduca ...

in 1937 with honors. Tanner earned a master's degree from the University of Florida in 1948. She married the psychologist Wilson Tanner in 1940 and they had four children. While living in

Ann Arbor, Michigan Ann Arbor is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the county seat of Washtenaw County, Michigan, Washtenaw County. The 2020 United States census, 2020 census recorded its population to be 123,851. It is the principal city of the Ann Arbor ...

, Tanner earned a PhD in history from the University of Michigan in 1961. Tanner started studying the history of Native Americans in the early 1960s when she read tribe maps that had "insufficient data" or "unknown tribes".

Career

Beginning in 1962, Tanner was a part of 16 Indian Claims Commission cases as an expert witness. Among such cases, Tanner worked in the case ''United States v. the State of Michigan'' to support the rights of Native Americans in fishing from the Great Lakes. Tanner summarized historical information about Native Americans and their fishing. Although her work was not often highly thought of by male historians and anthropologists, she was known as an authority on and friend of the Ojibwe and

Odawa The Odawa (also Ottawa or Odaawaa ), said to mean "traders", are an Indigenous American ethnic group who primarily inhabit land in the Eastern Woodlands region, commonly known as the northeastern United States and southeastern Canada. They ha ...

people who make their homes by the Great Lakes. Tanner was a part of the University of Michigan's Center for Continuing Education for Women for four years. While working there as an associate director and then a director, Tanner helped about 2,000 women. She created a fellowship program for American Indian women. She was an instructor at the University of Michigan and was a senior research fellow at the

Newberry Library The Newberry Library is an independent research library, specializing in the humanities and located on Washington Square in Chicago, Illinois. It has been free and open to the public since 1887. Its collections encompass a variety of topics rela ...

in Chicago. From 1984 to 1985, Tanner was the interim director at D'Arcy McNickle Center for American Indian History at the Newberry Library. She was a member of the American Society for Ethnohistory. Tanner was placed in the Michigan Women's Hall of Fame in 2006 "for achievement in history and American Indian rights". Tanner was given a National Endowment for the Humanities grant which allowed her to complete the ''Atlas of Great Lakes Indian History''. The atlas was published in 1987. Margaret Ramirez of the '' Chicago Tribune'' said that it was "hailed as the most comprehensive study of the region's Indian tribes". She has also written books about the

Caddo The Caddo people comprise the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma, a federally recognized tribe headquartered in Binger, Oklahoma. They speak the Caddo language. The Caddo Confederacy was a network of Indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands, wh ...

, the Ojibwe, and

Spanish Florida Spanish Florida ( es, La Florida) was the first major European land claim and attempted settlement in North America during the European Age of Discovery. ''La Florida'' formed part of the Captaincy General of Cuba, the Viceroyalty of New Spain, ...

in the early 18th century. While in her 80s, Tanner was a part of the major case ''

Minnesota v. Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians ''Minnesota v. Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians'', 526 U.S. 172 (1999), was a United States Supreme Court decision concerning the usufructuary rights of the Ojibwe (Chippewa) tribe to certain lands it had ceded to the federal government in 1837. ...

'' at the

Supreme Court of the United States The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...

in 1999. The case involved Ojibwe people being mistreated for more than a century for hunting, fishing, and gathering in land that was theirs via treaty rights. The case was ruled in favor of the Ojibwe.

Death

Tanner died on June 15, 2011, due to heart failure at 94 years old near Beulah, Michigan.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tanner, Helen Hornbeck 1916 births 2011 deaths American women human rights activists Swarthmore College alumni University of Florida alumni University of Michigan alumni People from Northfield, Minnesota American human rights activists University of Michigan faculty Historians from Michigan 20th-century American historians American women historians Writers from Michigan 20th-century American non-fiction writers