Ardina Moore (née Revard, December 1, 1930 – April 19, 2022) was a

Quapaw The Quapaw ( ; or Arkansas and Ugahxpa) people are a tribe of Native Americans that coalesced in what is known as the Midwest and Ohio Valley of the present-day United States. The Dhegiha Siouan-speaking tribe historically migrated from the Oh ...

/ Osage Native American from

Miami, Oklahoma Miami ( ) is a city in and county seat of Ottawa County, Oklahoma, United States, founded in 1891. Lead and zinc mining were established by 1918, causing the area's economy to boom. This area was part of Indian Territory. Miami is the capital of ...

. A fluent

Quapaw language Quapaw, or Arkansas, is a Siouan language of the Quapaw people, originally from a region in present-day Arkansas. It is now spoken in Oklahoma. It is similar to the other Dhegihan languages: Kansa, Omaha, Osage and Ponca. Written documentat ...

speaker, she developed a language preservation program and taught the language to younger tribal members. Moore was a fashion designer and regalia-maker, who founded an Indian apparel business, Buffalo Sun, in

, in 1983. She has received numerous awards for her fashion designs, has served in multiple leadership positions within the

Quapaw Tribe of Indians The Quapaw ( ; or Arkansas and Ugahxpa) people are a tribe of Native Americans that coalesced in what is known as the Midwest and Ohio Valley of the present-day United States. The Dhegiha Siouan-speaking tribe historically migrated from the Ohi ...

, and was inducted into the Oklahoma Women's Hall of Fame.

Early life

Ardina Revard was born on December 1, 1930, in

Belton, Texas Belton is a city in the U.S. state of Texas on the Interstate 35 corridor between Austin and Waco. Belton is the county seat of Bell County and is the fifth largest city in the Killeen-Temple metropolitan area. In 2020, the population of Belton ...

. Her father was James Osage "Jimmie" Revard (Osage), founder of the band the Oklahoma Playboys, and her mother was Martha Dora Griffin (Quapaw), who died when Revard was about seven years old. Her maternal grandparents were Minnie and Chief Victor Griffin, the last Quapaw chief before the tribe formed a business committee. Revard grew up speaking both English and Quapaw on the farm of Chief Griffin known as "Devil's Promenade" in northeastern Oklahoma. After finishing high school, Revard enrolled at

Northeastern State University Northeastern State University (NSU) is a public university with its main campus in Tahlequah, Oklahoma. The university also has two other campuses in Muskogee and Broken Arrow as well as online. Northeastern is the oldest institution of high ...

, graduating in 1957.

Early career

Moore began her teaching career, first teaching high school health and physical education. Then she taught American Indian history and genealogy at

Northeastern Oklahoma A&M College Northeastern Oklahoma A&M College (NEO) is a public community college in Miami, Oklahoma. Established as the Miami School of Mines in 1919, NEO has an enrollment of approximately two thousand students. The Golden Norsemen is the school mascot. ...

(NEO) in

. Between 1967 and 1978, she lived in Montana, but returned to Oklahoma with her family and discovered that the Quapaw language was endangered. She joined the Community Service Program, at NEO and began teaching evening language classes to preserve the Quapaw language, creating her own workbooks and tapes, as she had no dictionaries or textbooks on the language.

Artistic career

Moore, who had been making Native American fashions for her daughters to wear at

powwows A powwow (also pow wow or pow-wow) is a gathering with dances held by many Native American and First Nations communities. Powwows today allow Indigenous people to socialize, dance, sing, and honor their cultures. Powwows may be private or pu ...

, Indian dances or other functions, began commercially marketing Indian apparel in 1983. The company Buffalo Sun was located in Miami, Oklahoma, where Moore lived and designed the clothing. She also cut patterns which Native women sewed from their homes. The company made inner and outer wear as well as accessories, with traditional and contemporary fashions. Some were simple designs and others feature intricate

beadwork Beadwork is the art or craft of attaching beads to one another by stringing them onto a thread or thin wire with a sewing or beading needle or sewing them to cloth. Beads are produced in a diverse range of materials, shapes, and sizes, and vary b ...

and ribbonwork elements. She toured with her fashions throughout Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, and to both coasts, participating in the

Powhatan Renape Nation The Powhatan people (; also spelled Powatan) may refer to any of the indigenous Algonquian people that are traditionally from eastern Virginia. All of the Powhatan groups descend from the Powhatan Confederacy. In some instances, The Powhatan ...

fashion show in Pennsylvania and

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...

where fashion shows were held at the American Cultural Center and International Trade Center.

Language and cultural preservation efforts

From her beginning evening classes Moore expanded her program to save the Quapaw language to two series of classes, which span over an eight-week period and are held annually at the Quapaw Tribal Museum. The tribe also holds an annual Youth Language Camp, as well as conferences with the Dhegiha Language Conference to preserve and teach the Quapaw language and its closely related tongues, Osage and Omaha. In addition to her efforts to save the Quapaw language, Moore served as the tribe's powwow committee secretary/treasurer, tribal historian, chair of the tribe's Cultural Committee, and as an elected member of the Tribal Business Committee.

Awards and honors

Moore received many awards and honors over her career. She won first place in the

Santa Fe Indian Market The Santa Fe Indian Market is an annual art market held in Santa Fe, New Mexico on the weekend following the third Thursday in August. The event draws an estimated 150,000 people to the city from around the world. The Southwestern Association for ...

fashion show twice, was awarded best in her division at the Eiteljorg Museum's annual Indian Market in Indianapolis, was honored by the

Heard Museum The Heard Museum is a private, not-for-profit museum in Phoenix, Arizona, United States, dedicated to the advancement of American Indian art. It presents the stories of American Indian people from a first-person perspective, as well as exhibitio ...

of Phoenix in 2003, and was featured in an

Oklahoma Educational Television Authority The Oklahoma Educational Television Authority (OETA) is a state network of PBS member television stations serving the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The authority operates as a statutory corporation that holds the licenses for all of the PBS stati ...

special in 2006. In 2011, she was inducted into the Oklahoma Women's Hall of Fame.

Death

Moore died on April 19, 2022, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, at the age of 91.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Moore, Ardina 1930 births 2022 deaths American fashion designers American women fashion designers Artists from Oklahoma Northeastern State University alumni Educators from Texas American women educators Native American textile artists Osage people People from Miami, Oklahoma Quapaw Women textile artists Indigenous fashion designers of the Americas 21st-century American women 20th-century Native American women 21st-century Native American women Native American women artists