Tribal Leader and Tribal Advocate to Speak at WSU

PULLMAN, Wash. — “Who Speaks For America,” the on-going speaker series sponsored by Comparative American Cultures at Washington State University, continues Thursday, Feb. 20, with lectures by Billy Frank Jr. and Charles Wilkinson, two speakers whose lives have focused on issues facing Native Americans.

The two will speak at 7:30 p.m. in the Samuel H. Smith Center for Undergraduate Education, Room 203, on the WSU campus. The event is free and open to the public.

Billy Frank Jr. is chairman of the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission and an elder of the Nisqually Indian Tribe. A tribal leader for more than 30 years, Frank was one of the originators of the concept of “cooperative management,” which stresses common sense compromise rather than court intervention. Frank was awarded the 1992 Albert Schweitzer Award for Humanitarianism for his peacemaking efforts. Once known as “the last renegade of the Nisqually,” Frank’s peacemaking program has been used as a model to resolve natural resource conflicts in several states.

Charles Wilkinson received the 2000 Colorado Book Award for his book, “Messages From Frank’s Landing: A Story of Salmon, Treaties, and the Indian Way,” a profile of Billy Frank, Jr. Wilkinson is a recognized authority on law, history, and society in the American West. In its 10-year anniversary issue, Outside Magazine named him one of 15 “People to Watch,” calling him “the West’s leading authority on natural resources law.” He has served on the boards of The Wilderness Society, Northern Lights Institute, and the Western Environmental Law Center, and is currently board chair of the Grand Canyon Trust. Wilkinson has taken on many special assignments for the Departments of Interior, Agriculture, and Justice.

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